Should a Christian be a pacifist?

  • Thread starter Thread starter souldiver
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Peccavi said:
Why bother to read the Gospels if you choose to think in terms of the Old Testament. It is as if Jesus never had spoken and if he had not in language you approved of.
Click to expand...
That sort of attitude throws out typology as a way to understand Sacred Scripture.
 
Micosil said:
That sort of attitude throws out typology as a way to understand Sacred Scripture.
Click to expand...
Not only that, but it carries an implication that God acted immorally when He guided the Israelites in war.

Or that Christ did not speak in the Old Testament as well as the New.
 
Look if not for the U.S. navy long distance countries would have trouble trading with each other because of pirates.

The U.S. navy and military forces were built up over 100 years ago when they decided to stop paying Muslim pirates ransoms to hand back their American citizens taken as slaves in the waters of North Africa.

It is amazing how well bad people will behave when a rifle is pointed at them with the compunction to use it.

By saying that we all should be pacifists in the sense of never going to war we create and encourage a worse world.
 
otjm said:
Among other things, you should read a bit more history.
Click to expand...
A) I have an MA in History
b) I taught it to 16-18 year old students for 39 years
c) I have read history for over 50 years
and
d) there is more than one way of interpreting the evidence IF you are a trained historian which you must be since you chose to question my reading . Yes I have read about the Just War but not in the Gospels. Yes I have read recent essays on the origins of Christianity and yes I have discovered Jesus followers in Jerusalem led by James were called Nazarenes.
 
Peccavi said:
A) I have an MA in History
b) I taught it to 16-18 year old students for 39 years
c) I have read history for over 50 years
and
d) there is more than one way of interpreting the evidence IF you are a trained historian which you must be since you chose to question my reading . Yes I have read about the Just War but not in the Gospels. Yes I have read recent essays on the origins of Christianity and yes I have discovered Jesus followers in Jerusalem led by James were called Nazarenes.
Click to expand...
Th Catholic church believes that revelation stopped with the last apostle (John’ Gospel). However, the Church has read and meditated on Sacred Scripture over the centuries, and some issues in morals have been, for a lack of better word, nuanced.

One example would be slavery; at the Last Supper, when Christ washed the feet of the Apostes, he dressed as a slave before doing so; and Paul wrote concerning how one should treat a slave.

The Church now holds that slavery is wrong. That is not a new revelation, but rather centuries of reading Scripture, and how we are to treat one another.

There were both pacifists and warriors at the time of Christ, and have been ever since. The Just War theory has come out of that same contemplation.

And while the Church accepts justification for war, it is completely comfortable with someone choosing to be a pacifist.

You may choose to reject the Just War theory; it is not a matter of salvation if you do. However, to one degree or another, many who do, do so in isolation on non-involvement. Pushed far enough, most people will react to protect themselves and their loved ones. Would that be a moral failure for a pacifist? The Church would say no.
 
One of the most influential Catholics in my youth was Wilhelm Graf, a young German who opposed Hitler and the Nazis and defended Catholic independence as a pacifist. No better example of a true believer can be found.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willi_Graf
 
Peccavi said:
One of the most influential Catholics in my youth was Wilhelm Graf, a young German who opposed Hitler and the Nazis and defended Catholic independence as a pacifist. No better example of a true believer can be found.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willi_Graf
Click to expand...
And what about those who fought the Nazi regime and liberated the prisoners? Are they not real Christians as well? Doesn’t Scripture say the person who isn’t willing to fight for his family is a dog?
 
Difficult question for you Christians that. Read Bonhoeffer He struggled with it.
 
Peccavi said:
Difficult question for you Christians that. Read Bonhoeffer He struggled with it.
Click to expand...
I repeat my question: Were they less Christian than Binhoeffer? When soldiers came to John the Baptist or Jesus, did either of the two tell them to leave their jobs?
 
PolarGuy said:
With all due respect, TK421, a person isn’t a pacifist because they have no opportunity to do violence. A pacifist is a person who won’t use violence, period. I don’t become a pacifist because I work in an office at a white collar job. That’s what you seem to think pacifism is. It is not that, at all.

I have in fact debated - on this board - people who simply will not ever use violence, ever, including to stop the rape of their own daughter. I have major problems with that sort of extremism, as anyone would. That’s pacifism, and most of those people, I suspect, would want others to use violence to protect their daughters but wouldn’t do so themselves. That, to me, is cowardice, all the worse because it’s cowardice in the face of innocents who would expect the pacifists to protect them. Christians are not required to adhere to such extreme views.
Click to expand...
Yes. There are people in here who will not defend anyone. As for defending a loved one from being raped, I have seen the defense that the rape and/or murder is a sort of martyrdom for their loved one and should be considered an honor. Like they are doing the victim a favor by their unwillingness to defend the victim.
 
Sarcelle said:
Yes. There are people in here who will not defend anyone. As for defending a loved one from being raped, I have seen the defense that the rape and/or murder is a sort of martyrdom for their loved one and should be considered an honor. Like they are doing the victim a favor by their unwillingness to defend the victim.
Click to expand...
:eek:
 
We have a duty to defend the weak, the vulnerable, the innocent. When we act to defend ourselves, our family, or the vulnerable from death we are acting not to intentionally kill the aggressor, but to protect the innocent. In such cases the protection of life is the intended action, the killing of the aggressor in such cases is an unintended act.

We have a duty to defend the innocent, even if that means using lethal force as a last resort. But it must be a last resort, if we can stop the aggressor through any other means, negotiation, escape, wounding etc, then we must not use lethal force.
 
Brendan_64 said:
We have a duty to defend the weak, the vulnerable, the innocent. When we act to defend ourselves, our family, or the vulnerable from death we are acting not to intentionally kill the aggressor, but to protect the innocent. In such cases the protection of life is the intended action, the killing of the aggressor in such cases is an unintended act.

We have a duty to defend the innocent, even if that means using lethal force as a last resort. But it must be a last resort, if we can stop the aggressor through any other means, negotiation, escape, wounding etc, then we must not use lethal force.
Click to expand...
As my CCW instructor told the class, “We don’t shoot to kill, we don’t shoot not to kill, we shoot to stop the threat.”
 
I thought Christians should be pacifist. Such as letting yourself or others getting raped, I thought it’s called martyrdom and is commendable to God. I thought it’s a great act of faith like some of the most faithful Christian martyrs.
 
souldiver said:
I thought Christians should be pacifist. Such as letting yourself or others getting raped, I thought it’s called martyrdom and is commendable to God. I thought it’s a great act of faith like some of the most faithful Christian martyrs.
Click to expand...
If someone attempts to rape my wife, I am most certainly not obliged to stand by and let it happen.

We are obliged to defend the weak and the vulnerable, we have a duty to defend our families, and we have a right to self-defence. The force we use must be proportionate and lethal force must only be used as an absolute last resort when there are no other options left (and this action may only be used against the attacker). The intended purpose must to be to defend the innocent, not to kill the attacker (but this may be an unwanted effect of the action). Action motivated by vengeance, retaliation, or the desire to punish is not permitted.

Dying for one’s faith is one thing, but letting others be raped and murdered when you are in a position to do something about it is something else entirely.
 
Brendan_64 said:
If someone attempts to rape my wife, I am most certainly not obliged to stand by and let it happen.

We are obliged to defend the weak and the vulnerable, we have a duty to defend our families, and we have a right to self-defence. The force we use must be proportionate and lethal force must only be used as an absolute last resort when there are no other options left (and this action may only be used against the attacker). The intended purpose must to be to defend the innocent, not to kill the attacker (but this may be an unwanted effect of the action). Action motivated by vengeance, retaliation, or the desire to punish is not permitted.

Dying for one’s faith is one thing, but letting others be raped and murdered when you are in a position to do something about it is something else entirely.
Click to expand...
Thanks, you’ve been constructive.
 
souldiver said:
Is that what Jesus and the Apostles teach? Especially, should Catholics be. I always thought that the Crusades may be “just” but is not a pacifist approach.
Click to expand...
How can a Christian be passive when there is an intrusion against Christian teaching that tells Christians they should be passive to the immorality of culture. One thing I have always found is that the one who knows most about how a Christian ought to react, has never actually been one.
 
Speaking of war.
This a quote from the writer George Orwell.

“People sleep peacefully in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.”
 
I think violence is an unavoidable part of life because of man’s fallen nature. I accept that sometimes violence, or the threat of violence, is necessary.

Of course we should try to structure our relationships, both personal and communal to avoid violence. But i agree with others who believe that a blanket refusal of violence actually creates more of it.

I think this is the same question that the church struggled with during the Muslim invasions which preceded the Crusades.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top