Religion, war, and peace: It is odd that the churches have always failed to recognize that it should be their task to ensure that human beings put their point of commitment at the highest possible level. On the issue of peace and war they have been particularily remiss in this respect. Their attitude towards pacifism, for example, is all the more odd when we remember that the primitive christian church was pacifist, that the conclusion drawn by the early Christians from their faith was that they should never bear arms. But even odder still is the way the churches have behaved over the question of the use of nuclear power for military purposes, for even after Christianity became the sanctioned religion of the Roman Empire there was, and there always has been, a recognition that the doctrine of the Just War was developed. What a doctrine! The Christian churches, whatever they may have done in practice, have never sanctioned the indiscriminate use of force in the past; never, that is, until this century. At long last they are begining to abandon the argument that to sanction nuclear warfare or any other indiscriminate means of waging war could ever be the lesser of two evils. Can the man of faith fight for his country? In theory, yes, if his conscience so permits. But his conscience needs to be alert and informed. I am convinced that seldom if ever in the modern world would an enlightened conscience give such permission, and certainly not if the fighting were for the preservation of sectional or national interests as distinct from the interests of mankind as a whole, or were likely to embroil other countries in a national or global war. Have the teachings of religion been used to justify war? Alas, yes; all too often. But in the modern world, thank God, even those conditions that have always been regarded as necessary for the concept of the JUST WAR no longer obtain Are discussions of the morality or immorality of war relevant in international politics? Most certainly, yes, else religious faith itself is quite irrelevant to mans condition in this world. Are religious ethics the chief force shaping mans response to war? yes, I think they are - if not the chief force, certainly a vital one: that is why it is essential that men of religious faith should think out with maximum care the significance of their faith in therms of political and social action. Christians, and persons of all religious faiths, should in my opinion, today concentrate at least upon three points. First, the creation of a genuine world authority with the will and the power to preserve justice and peace among all peoples of the world. We have not taken that seriously in the churches, for Gods sake let us start doing so. - John Collins peace - making and Pacicism (1968)
Posted on: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 19:14:27 +0000
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