In a series of recent articles and books, the Catholic theologian William T. Cavanaugh has leveled a profound challenge to the modern state. He critiques its pretentions to be a savior and to provide social cohesion. He proposes that the church should provide resistance to, and even be an alternative to, the modern state. While Cavanaugh draws creative insights from Augustine's political thought, he misuses that thought in ways that dismiss the positive goods provided by the government. Cavanaugh also makes a positive contribution to Catholic social ethics by employing “the social imaginary” to describe the modern state, but overemphasizes the states historical distinctiveness, downplaying what it has in common with earlier forms of political community, namely the pursuit of bodily well-being and social organization.