15.4: Just War

Christianity is a religion of peace, but Christians have to live in a world where people sometimes make war against each other. Therefore, Christianity has had to develop an attitude to war. There are two attitudes. One is the just war theory; the other is pacifism.

The just war theory is as follows. War is sometimes necessary to prevent a greater evil. For instance, fighting the Nazis was essential to prevent the evil of Nazism, which was a threat to civilisation, from spreading. Hitler would not have been deterred by negotiations and compromise.

The just war theory lays down several conditions for just war to take place, and each condition must be met.

1. The cause must be serious enough to justify war.
2. There must be no other means of solving the problem and/or all other such means must have been exhausted.
3. There must be a reasonable expectation that the good to come out of fighting outweighs the evil.
4. The war must be called by a legitimate authority.
5. The damage done must not be greater than is necessary to achieve the aims of fighting.
6. The fighting must be for morally legitimate aims.

The principle behind the just was theory is that although good does not come from evil, destroying evil allows us to work to repair the damage and to do good.

Pacifism, however, says that war is always evil, and from evil good can never come. Therefore, war is always immoral and serves no useful purpose. Pacifism arose from the experience of the First World War, with the mass horrors that occurred. Some pacifists argue that modern weapons have become so powerful that excessive destruction must take place. This is particularly so in the case of nuclear weapons, which are weapons of mass destruction. Such weapons kill innocent people and damage the environment. This is considered to be excessive violence.

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There is also the problem of rebellion against unjust authority. The general conditions of just war apply here. Christians also say that there must be no other way of deposing the unjust government, so that a rebellion in a democratic society cannot be right.

Christianity has also been aware that civil disorder can produce great evils, and that in general the poor and the weak always suffer when there is civil disorder. They often provide opportunities for criminals, and often torture and violence takes place, as has happened in Bosnia. For this reason Christianity regards rebellions as very much the last resort.

Yet Christianity accepts that people can defy unjust laws. This principle has two sides to it. One is that certain laws are so unjust that they must not be obeyed. In these situations Christians are not taking militant action, they are merely saying that they will not comply with unjust laws. For instance, Christians have suffered rather than deny their faith, and there are parts of the world, for instance Central America, where Christians have suffered at the hands of unjust governments for their support of the poor. In general laws made by a democratically elected assembly should be obeyed, unless there is grave reason not to. Such a reason would be, for instance, that the law tried to force you to infringe human rights or go against your religion.

There is also non-violent protest against unjust decisions. This is considered acceptable, as it does not involve the taking of life. In such cases protesters will try to obstruct the authority by lying down in roads and chaining themselves to railings, and so on. This has been tried by antinuclear protesters and people protesting against certain road building schemes. However, such protest must be against something wrong, not just something that we dislike.