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There's a theological theory about when it is right and just to engage in war. It makes sense in its own way. But something is amiss in it. No leaders can go to war without people to fight the war for them. Why do Christians agree to fight the wars of their nation's leaders?
I see your point, it is applicable to several recent wars and, of course, one current war.Good question, particularly if the enemy is other Christians.
I'll extend the question: Is the war still just if you goaded the other nation into it, or you failed to negotiate peacefully when you had the opportunity?
There's a theological theory about when it is right and just to engage in war. It makes sense in its own way. But something is amiss in it. No leaders can go to war without people to fight the war for them. Why do Christians agree to fight the wars of their nation's leaders?
They agree because the war is just. Just war is defined as defending the innocent, standing up for that which is right, etc. Should we allow someone to come into our house and murder our family if we can prevent it?There's a theological theory about when it is right and just to engage in war. It makes sense in its own way. But something is amiss in it. No leaders can go to war without people to fight the war for them. Why do Christians agree to fight the wars of their nation's leaders?
They agree because the war is just. Just war is defined as defending the innocent, standing up for that which is right, etc. Do we allow somehow to come into our house and murder our family?
all right so, for example, there have never been aggressors with unjust intentions towards a relatively innocent and peaceful neighbor? No one seeking to take from another what doesn't rightfully belong to them? No reason for the Allies to defend themselves or the Jews against Nazism or native Americans against their aggressors? I mean, even if only one war fits the definition, the theory is valid.. And, again, the concept is no different from defending your family from an intruder.That's not the origin of the vast majority of wars, however.
all right so, for example, there have never been aggressors with unjust intentions towards a relatively innocent and peaceful neighbor? No one seeking to take from another what doesn't rightfully belong to them? No reason for the Allies to defend themselves or the Jews against Nazism or native Americans against their aggressors? I mean, even if only one war fits the definition, the theory is valid.
All right, I suppose the Holocaust was the Allies fault to. It's a fallen world. That doesn't mean we let everyone run over us just because no one's perfectly innocent.
And, you're right if there's a just war then we should desire to wage it in order to defend the innocent. To the extent we're able, just as we defend our family in such a case. That doesn't mean that the limitations and politics and fear won't play their respective roles as well and possibly prevent us from doing what is otherwise the right thing. Should we help with Ukraine now? Is the suffering and death there irrelevant?
All right, I suppose the Holocaust was the Allies fault to. It's a fallen world. That doesn't mean we let everyone run over us just because no one's perfectly innocent.
And, you're right if there's a just war then we should desire to wage it in order to defend the innocent. To the extent we're able, just as we defend our family in such a case. That doesn't mean that the limitations and politics and fear won't play their respective roles as well and possibly prevent us from doing what is otherwise the right thing. Should we help with Ukraine now? Is the suffering and death there irrelevant?
”We” are all people, as all people are called to do the right thing. That doesn’t mean that “we” will always do it.
It has nothing to do with having political power but everything to do with, as examples, whether one has the right and duty to defend the innocent, to risk their lives for another, to use force to defend their own families. Answer those questions and you’ll have the reason behind the just war theory.If Just War Theory is the definition of what is minimally acceptable (which is the point), then we should take seriously when the ancient saints and fathers spoke emphatically that military service was, in fact, in opposition to the Christian way. St. Martin of Tours, for example, when he was being pressed into military service emphatically said that, as a soldier of Christ he was not permitted to fight. St. Marcellus of Tangiers cast off his military belt in front of the emperor, which ultimately gave him his martyr's crown. St. Hippolytus in his Apostolic Traditions writes that a catechumen/baptismal candidate who does not cast aside his military belt and oath is to be rejected.
The fathers are not mild in their opposition to war and violence, they are exceptionally clear. Just War Theory did not exist until Christians started having political power as magistrates and emperors. Which is why St. Augustine, for example, bothered at all to try to craft a Just War Theory. Just War Theory is, itself, a compromise. There was no such thing as a Just War Theory for the fathers who lived before the Edict of Toleration. Just War Theory is a response and reaction to a brand new event in the history of the Church: Christians in positions of political power, Christianity as the favored, and later official religion of the Empire.
And there is valid, patristic, reason to challenge that co-mingling of Church and State that was forged, ultimately, under Theodosius I. After all, it doesn't take a genius to see that the collusion of Church and State was a miserable failure. Whether we are talking Byzantine or Western political power. The Church has always been most faithful when she is not in charge of the world, but when she is suffering in it. And this can be seen throughout history, whether we are talking the Holy Martyrs of Nagasaki, the precious saints who came through the Diocletian persecution, or both Protestant and Catholic martyrs in the post-Reformation era.
Embracing the State as anything more than a public necessity for the organization of human civilization has consistently resulted in the compromise of the Christian faith. Crusades, pogroms, the holocaust, it is all the collaborative guilt of us, as Christ's people in the world. Our failure to be faithful disciples. Such things should drive us to our knees in repentance. It's why St. Pope John Paul II actively devoted himself to a ministry of reconciliation and repentance. That's what it means to fear God. Which Christians in the modern era have forgotten. Especially in their love of political power.
-CryptoLutheran
War is never to be desired. Should Ukraine fight back or not? Or does any country have the right, ever, to defend itself? “We” is all people when deciding whether or not war is ever justifiable."We" is never "all people" when going to war.
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