The Church of England moved away from a left-wing approach to benefits as it published a new paper on the welfare state and praised the "moral purpose" of the government's welfare policies.

The discussion paper endorsed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York marks the latest in a long and often volatile line of Church commentary on the welfare state. But this latest intervention is softer in its criticism of the Tory government than previous papers.

Thinking afresh about welfare was published on Tuesday and focused on the "evil" of isolation in the UK. It offered a pessimistic assessment of the ability of the welfare state to tackle this problem.

"The burden on the state has become unsustainable, outstripping the willingness of the people as a whole to pay for it," said the report. "Nor is uniform state welfare always efficient or effective – it can be bureaucratic, inflexible and reduce the self-worth of those who depend upon it."

The tone is a shift away from the pre-election interjection made by John Sentamu and Justin Welby. In their book On Rock or Sand published in January 2015, the two Anglican leaders portrayed the welfare state as the fulfillment of Jesus' command to "love your neighbour".

However the report said although Christians should support the vulnerable, "none of that is an argument for giving the state any particular role in designing and delivering welfare".

The Church's report said the government's current welfare agenda was "not without moral purpose" and admitted it had failed in the past to see the "moral vision" of Margaret Thatcher's government.

"We must avoid the trap of seeing present [welfare] policy direction as motivated solely by economic concerns," it said.

However the report criticised the way the government's sanctions policy was carried out. Although it said sanctions should be used to change "iresponsible behaviour", the "crude way" they had been applied was seen as "random and punitive and failing to reflect the difficulties of life for people with few means".

However the report said it supported the government's principle that benefits should not pay more than full-time work.