Fascinating email debate between two conservative Catholic intellectuals, Princeton University legal scholar Robert P. George and Douglas Kmiec, a Pepperdine University legal scholar. Kmiec was one of the most outspoken “pro-life” Obama supportors during the most recent election and George is a contributor at MoralAccountability.com. We have now entered a brave, new world that will bring about the destruction of much life. My heart is broken for the age we are now entering.

Challenging article about pacifism from Evangelical Village. I will admit to feeling drawn to pacifism, but I agree with many of the concerns below, which is causing me to reassess my “commitment” to pacifism.

One of our contributors preached a great sermon recently asking the question:

Is War Reconcilable with the Teachings of Jesus?

You can listen to the whole sermon in the link above. Below I am going to give you the main points of the sermon.

There has ben a recent surge of pacifism within Christianity. This surge has mainly found itself within the movements of the Emergent church and Red Letter Christianity. I, personally, along with the sermon at the top, feel that there are some very serious errors with pacifism. Let’s go through some of them:

1) Pacifism fails to distinguish between individual and civil conduct. In Matthew 5 Jesus is very clearly speaking on an individual bases, not civil. Romans 13 gives a clear command to the government to ‘bear the sword.’ There is not a command in Scripture that tells individuals to punish those do evil, but there is a command in Scripture that tells the government to punish those who do evil. Scripture clearly distinguishes between individual and civil.

2) Pacifism suffers from a naive optimism about the nature of man.

3) Pacifism if consistently applied cannot lead to anything, except anarchy. If violence or any type of forceful mean is never a viable option from civil authorities for justice then we have to get rid of police! If we follow the logic of pacifism we wind up with no type of civil authority than can establish justice. Without that authority anarchy is inevitable.

4) Pacifism fails to treat members of the military like Jesus and the Apostles treat members of the military. Every time Jesus and the Apostles interact with people from the military they never mention the military being wrong, ever. Multiple times people of the military are being commended for their faith. Cornelius is described as an upright, God fearing man. If serving in the military is wrong then why do we never see Jesus or the Apostles condemning the practice? Why do we see no one repenting of their military service when they encounter Jesus or are saved? Such as Cornelius and the military man that Jesus says, ‘I have never in all of Israel seen someone with such faith.’ In Luke 3 soldiers walk up to John the Baptist and ask what they should we do in order to follow ‘the way’ that John speaks of… John responds by telling them ‘not to extort money from anyone and be content with their wages.’ That is all he says. If we were to view military service as wrong and sinful, as most pacifists do, then John would of had to tell them to repent of their sin of being in the military in order to follow the way of Jesus. But he doesn’t. he only tells them not to extort and be content with their wages. If a murder were to walk up to John and ask the same question it would be foolish to think that John wouldn’t say, “Stop your lifestyle of murder.”

5) Pacifism poses a problem with the communication of the New Testament. There is Scripture all throughout the New Testament that uses military language. We are told to be ‘good soldiers in Christ.’ There is a pattern of military language that is used to describe a believers life. You would never, as a communicator, use an unrighteous analogy to make a righteous point. If being a soldier and being in the military is wrong, it is rather ridiculous for Paul to use language that calls us to be ‘good soldiers in Christ Jesus.’

6) Pacifism forces you to love your enemy at the expense of your neighbor. The pacifist is forced to say, ‘we will not act because we are to love our enemies.’ Which means they see it as wrong to try and stop, with force, tyrants such as Hitler, Stalin etc… Why? Because we are to love our enemies. But what about the millions of innocent people that were slaughtered at the hands of Stalin and Hitler? Is sitting by and doing nothing really following the command of Jesus to love our neighbor as these millions are slaughtered? I think not.

This article from Hunter Baker hits very close to home. I sometimes feel like I defend capitalism more than I should. I need to cling to Christ, not a market system.

Without Christ this is a world in which the strong will abuse the weak, the rich ignore or exploit the poor, and those with authority seek advantages for themselves as they exercise their power. We know these things both from the Scriptures and from examining our own hearts.

If our cultural critique is to have integrity, we must simultaneously respect the market and call the corporate sector to righteousness in its business dealings. As uncomfortable as Mike Huckabee’s concerns with executive compensation made many Republicans, his words suggested a healthy willingness critically to examine corporate behavior. If we question corporations when they produce bad products like pornography and gambling operations, then we necessarily accept the notion that the logic of free markets does not insulate them from critique when they commit other types of wrongs.

Francis Schaeffer (still a model for conservative Protestants) is generally remembered as an advocate for the Christian worldview. What has often been forgotten are his strong words about American materialism. Schaeffer lauded the hippies for their diagnosis of the ills of our society. Americans, he charged, are addicted to personal peace and affluence.

For a long time my natural instinct, the one that kept me deaf to the complaints of those claiming to have been treated unjustly, has been to defend the corporate estate against all criticisms. We must not be so passive even toward a system that has provided so well for most of us. Is the answer more government? No. The answer is to consistently call for righteousness.

From Fr. John Jay Hughes, serving in the Archdiocese of St. Louis, Missouri

A good entry point for persuading people that abortion is wrong is pointing out the chilling similarities between the arguments for slavery in the 1850s and those used to defend abortion today. Like today’s pro-choice people, slaveholders said they weren’t forcing others to own slaves. They simply pleaded for the right to do what they wanted with their “property.” That word disguised, of course, the fact that human lives were at stake. The question of pro-choice people today, “Doesn’t a woman have a right to do what she wants with her body?” similarly disguises the fact that exercising these so-called rights involves taking a human life.

The slaveholders’ pro-choice argument also lives on today in the bumper stickers that read: “Against abortion? Don’t have one.” Would those who display that sticker display one which said: “Against slavery? Don’t own one”? They’d be ashamed. (For further information about the parallels between pre-Civil War slaveholders and pro-choice people today, see the book by federal judge John T. Noonan, A Private Choice.)

When Americans are as ashamed of abortion as we now are of slavery, the battle will be won.

From Jordan Hylden’s article Aliens and Citizens

Hauerwas really did say it best: “The first responsibility of the church is to be the church.” It’s only when we learn to live first and truly as the body of Christ that our politics can be a witness to the city of man; it’s only when we set our eyes on the New Jerusalem that our life in Babylon can shine like a “city on a hill.”

The paradox of it can’t be let go—if for the sake of political witness or “relevance” we immerse ourselves in the politics of the world, we will wind up having nothing to say that the world has not already heard. But if our witness truly does flow out of the gospel politics of the church, we will begin to find that our words have surprising freshness and power—because finally, they will be telling the city of man about what it most needs to hear, which is the peace of the city of God.

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But while it’s absolutely correct that the church’s gospel politics needs to come first, we should remember that the church nevertheless is the “already” in what is mostly still a “not yet” world. Paul argued that although the new age opened up by Christ’s resurrection does indeed take priority over the old age, it’s not quite right to say that the old age is simply over and done with. Paul thought that secular governments are used by God to govern the world, and that they can be a force for good, even in their coercive roles. Theologians such as Augustine, Luther, and Bonhoeffer took up Paul’s line of thought, reasoning that because God providentially works through governments, jobs, and families, Christians can and should participate in them.

It’s no compromise to believe that Christians are called to act like Christians in the many places in the world that are not the church—in our jobs, schools, communities, and governments. Involvement in secular institutions is no substitute for the gospel, of course. But it would be a small gospel indeed that could have no effect on the way they are run. As William Wilberforce showed, such involvement can make a real difference in the world and can itself be a witness to the gospel. Wilberforce would argue that it’s by no means less than Christian to “seek the good” of the Babylons where we live by participating in secular politics, as did Daniel and the rest of the exiled Israelites.

The trick is never forgetting where we come from, where our true homeland lies, and which Sovereign we ultimately serve. The second-century Letter to Diognetus described the Christian life in the world this way: “They live in their own countries, but only as aliens; they have a share in everything as citizens, and endure everything as foreigners. … They busy themselves on earth, but their citizenship is in heaven.”

It’s not a bad way to put it. “In this world we have no abiding city,” as Scripture tells us—but so long as we are here, our call is to work and pray that our Father’s will be done “on earth as it is in heaven.” That’s gospel politics.

From Richard John Neuhaus in anticipation of the annual fall meeting of the American bishops of the Catholic Church

After the election, some Catholics with itching ears who are manifestly embarrassed by the Church’s being out of step with the new world of “the change we’ve been waiting for” have gleefully pointed out that the assertiveness of the bishops had little political effect. In the presidential and other races, Catholics voted for pro-abortion candidates. So what? It is not the business of bishops to win political races. It is the business of bishops to defend and teach the faith, including the Church’s moral doctrine. One hopes they will keep that firmly in mind in their Baltimore meeting.

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There are deeper problems. In the last four decades, following the pattern of American Protestantism, many, perhaps most, Catholics view the Church in terms of consumption rather than obligation. The Church is there to supply their spiritual needs as they define those needs, not to tell them what to believe or do. This runs very deep both sociologically and psychologically. It is part of the “success” of American Catholics in becoming just like everybody else. Bishops and all of us need to catch the vision of John Paul II that the Church imposes nothing, she only proposes. But what she proposes she believes is the truth, and because human beings are hard-wired for the truth, the truth imposes. And truth obliges.

It is not easy to communicate this understanding in our time, as it has not been easy in any time. In the twentieth century, the motto of the ecumenical movement was “Let the Church be the Church.” The motto was sometimes betrayed by that movement, but it should be courageously embraced by the bishops meeting in Baltimore. The bishops must set aside public relations and political calculations, and be prepared to surrender themselves anew to the task for which they were ordained, to uncompromisingly defend and communicate the faith once delivered to the saints.

Douglas Kmiec has been an outspoken Catholic in favor of Barack Obama and considers himself pro-life even though he supported a pro-abortion candidate in Obama. Here is a quote from Ross Doughat addressing Kmiec and the issue of abortion in the GOP

I suppose I could find a thing or three to agree with in Kmiec’s longer list of ideas for how the party he abandoned could win back his vote. But frankly, I don’t see the point. I understand that the pro-life position on abortion does not command majority support in the United States and that people of good will can disagree on the subject. And I have no doubt that the Republican Party can profit from greater dialogue between its pro-life and pro-choice constituents—and do a better job, as well, of addressing itself to both pro-lifers and pro-choicers who aren’t already inside its tent. But I can’t begin to fathom why the GOP should consider taking any advice whatsoever from a “pro-lifer” who has spent the past year serving as an increasingly embarrassing shill for the opposition party’s objectively pro-abortion nominee.

From Al Mohler, President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, on Is the Abortion Argument Changing?

But I just cannot get past one crucial, irreducible, and central issue — the moral status of those unborn lives. They are not mine to negotiate. If abortion were a matter of concern for anything less than this, I would gladly negotiate. But abortion is a matter of life and death, and how can we negotiate with death? What moral sense does it make to settle for death as “safe, legal, and rare?” How safe? How rare?

Our considerations of these questions will reveal what we really think of those millions of unborn lives. Do we consider the battle for their lives permanently lost?

Those fighting for the abolition of slavery pressed on against obstacles and set backs worse than these because, after all, these were human lives they were defending. What if they had listened to those who, after Dred Scott and the Missouri Compromise, said that the battle was “permanently” lost? What if they had been intimidated by critics accusing them of “single-issue” voting?

If every single fetus is an unborn child made in the image of God, there is no moral justification for settling for a vague hope of some reduction in the number of fetal homicides. If the abortion fight is “permanently lost,” it will be lost first among those who claim to be defenders of life — those who tell us that the argument is merely changing.