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The moral authority of pontiffs has long been used to cajole world leaders into peace and reconciliation.
Earlier this year, for instance, Pope Francis tried to restart talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority with a prayer service that included Shimon Peres and Mahmoud Abbas.
That tradition of papal peace-making lends even more weight to the remarks this week from Pope Francis on the threat of ISIS and the genocide in Iraq and Syria.
Talking with the press on his plane as it left South Korea, the pope warned that “unjust aggression” had to be stopped and that action from the international community would be “legitimate.”
The Associated Press immediately ran the remarks with a headline announcing that the pope had endorsed the use of military force against ISIS, later changing it to “Pope Oks Protecting Iraq Minorities.”
Reuters’ story carried the banner “Pope says legitimate for world to stop Islamist aggression in Iraq.”
Has the Vatican abandoned pacifism? Not exactly.
While Vox and others hyperbolically suggested that Francis had issued a call for a new crusade, the pontiff hardly asked for a Western campaign of conquest.
Francis’ remarks fall within what could be called a tradition of conditional pacifism, one that recognizes the limits of dialogue and negotiation in the prosecution of violent evils such as genocide.
Francis seeks the restoration of peace, which on occasions means the use of force for that purpose — and that purpose only.
It may come as a surprise to many that the Catholic Church still adheres to the “just war” doctrine, which applies to the gap left when negotiation and dialogue either fail or have no rational application.
The Catechism, which outlines the application of Catholic faith in the world, expressly notes the circumstances in which this occurs, as well as the strictures for operating within Christian morality when it occurs. Continue reading
Sources
- The Week
- Image: Activist Post
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