"In the life of the church, just war theories are a secondary element in Catholic teaching; the first is that we should not engage in warfare at all" he said in an interview with Vatican News.

Cardinal McElroy's comments come as global conflicts escalate, prompting fresh debate on the Church's role in conflict resolution.

The cardinal is a key adviser to the Catholic Institute for Nonviolence, which will open in Rome on 29 September. Pax Christi International, a global Catholic peace movement, will launch the new institute.

McElroy's remarks align with the position often voiced by Pope Francis. In 2022, the Pope said it was "time to rethink the concept of a ‘just war'", stressing that resorting to war contradicts constructive dialogue. Francis has repeatedly called for reevaluating traditional Church teachings that historically justified certain wars under the ‘just war' doctrine.

Alternative ways to resolve conflict

In July this year, Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin echoed these concerns, noting that the theory is being revised.

"There is a lot of discussion today because this ('just war') is a concept of social doctrine. There is just war, the war of defence but today, with the weapons that are available, this concept becomes very difficult" Parolin said.

Cardinal McElroy reiterated that violence in any form is contrary to the Gospel. He added "it's ever more important that the church be a witness to finding alternative ways to resolve these conflicts as they break out".

McElroy also highlighted that peacebuilding goes beyond merely ending conflicts; it involves promoting human dignity and solidarity.

Drawing from Pope Francis' 2020 encyclical Fratelli Tutti, McElroy pointed out that the Church must adopt new perspectives, especially regarding marginalised regions.

"We have blinders in our minds about the peripheries, and we think some regions are less important" the cardinal said. "That is a poison and certainly contrary to the Gospel."

Sources

National Catholic Reporter

CathNews New Zealand

CathNews New Zealand

When it is distant, it involves people whose nationality and culture we do not share, and wrongs of whose cause are disputed.

But it does not affect us at gut level.

When it is someone who has walked our streets, swum on our beaches, speaks our language as their own, and dies when helping victims of war, war becomes personal.

Israel and Hamas

The killing of Zomi Frankcom, together with other members of the Charity organisation World Central Kitchen, made the war between Israel and Hamas personal.

It has led many people to see the destruction of Gaza and its people as not only regrettable but intolerable.

For many Australians, of course, the war was already personal.

Many people of Israeli and Palestinian origin had already lost family members and friends and grieved for their fellows abused, wounded, driven from their homes and starved.

Yet other Australians did not take their suffering personally.

It was distanced by being set within the framework of international relations and military strategy.

Faces became numbers and the human destruction of war a regrettable necessity.

Now that the victims of the Israeli armed forces' invasion of Gaza have a human and Australian face, we shall be called on take a stand.

We ought to heed that call to pressure the opposed parties to end the war. War is the enemy.

Taking sides

To take a stand, however, is not the same as taking sides.

That is a fatal mistake.

Both sides contribute to the making and sustaining of war. To take sides is to perpetuate the war.

To take sides with the Israeli Government or with Hamas inevitably leads us to move away from the human, disfigured faces whose destruction is the business of war.

It leads us to see the dead and injured and homeless as statistics.

Their value then depends on the side to which they belong.

The deliberate killing of non-combatants associated with the other side will be called an accident or a mistake and their faces whitewashed.

The similar killing of people on one's own side will be seen as an atrocity and their faces weaponised.

Taking sides will deepen the hostility that led to war and will perpetuate the cycle of violence.

To take a stand against the war in Gaza demands focusing on the human faces of the persons destroyed by it.

To do that, of course, we must also engage in arguments whether the war and the actions taken in it are just. But we must not be trapped in them.

Justice and justification

Argument about whether a war is just is generally rigged to produce reasons why one's own side is justified in fighting the war and the other side is not.

It is also used to justify the strategies and actions that the chosen side adopts. It assumes that if God is on your side you can do anything you want to God's enemies.

Once again the human face of war, central in evaluating its justification, is disregarded.

If we reflect on whether a war is justifiable while at the same time attending closely to its human face, the classical rules for waging a just war are helpful.

Their starting point is that all human lives are precious.

For war to be justified, a number of conditions must be met both in its declaration (ius ad bellum) and in its conduct (ius in bello).

Today's wars

Classical rules envisage conflict between the armed forces of different and recognisable states, not military action against minority groups or with failed states.

Therefore, some of the traditional tests for declaring a war just are not applicable to situations today.

The two central rules, however, remain relevant.

Both must be satisfied for a war to be called just. The first is that war is unjustifiable unless it is fought in defence of a just cause.

This is most often self-defence, but it could also include responding to serious injustice perpetrated by the other side.

In Gaza, as in most military conflicts both sides claim that their continuing military action is justifiable because it is taken for self-defence and for the redress of injustice.

Even if a war is held to be for a just cause, however, it must also meet a second condition.

It must be proportionate.

This means that its goal of redressing injustice or defending the nation must be realisable and that the human good achieved by the military action must exceed the human harm.

It is difficult to see how the conduct of the war in Gaza by Hamas or by Israel satisfies either of these criteria. Nor does it satisfy the third test of a just war: that it should be waged only after negotiation to avoid war.

Just war theory

In just war theory a just cause and proportionate framing of the action do not alone make a war just.

The military strategies and actions adopted taken must also satisfy strict criteria.

First, they must be discriminating.

They must not target civilians.

The value of each human life demands that the loss of civilian lives must be coincidental to military action and not intended by it.

In Gaza, the huge number of deaths of non-combatants reported by the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, and accounts of such things as the use of AI to identify suspected members of Hamas and of unguided bombs to kill both them and those around them, witness to a disregard for human lives in both strategy and in rules of engagement.

The second criterion for justice in the conduct of war is proportionality.

The human benefits achieved by military action must outweigh the human harm caused by it. It is difficult to see that the war in Gaza, and particularly the military action by the Israeli armed forces, satisfy this criterion.

The stated means to achieve the goal of self-defence is to destroy Hamas.

This is then taken to demand destroying the human habitat of Gaza in order to eradicate the presence and influence of Hamas within it.

The massive number of civilian casualties, the destruction of the necessary conditions for human life such as houses, meeting places, hospitals, health services and schools, and the starving of the civilian population deny the equal value of each human life.

They are massively disproportionate.

Furthermore, this strategy and the actions that flow from it will not lead to peace but to the hatred that will ensure future conflict and breed the soldiers who will fight in it.

Their logical endpoint is the destruction or enslavement of the people of Palestine.

Making a just peace

The present path is inconsistent with the conviction that each human being matters equally, the necessary belief for establishing a lasting and just peace.

These considerations explain why recent Popes have said that modern war can never be justified.

The destructive power of modern weapons inevitably leads to the denial of the unique value of human being and the consequent destruction of the conditions necessary for living with human dignity.

It also corrupts even in those whose cause is just the respect for humanity essential to its justice.

That moral corruption was evident in the bombing of Dresden and Hiroshima and in the defences subsequently made for them.

Gaza is yet another demonstration of the injustice of war and of its power to corrupt human judgment. It must be met by seeing and feeling the lives of those destroyed in it as personal.

• First published in Eureka Street
• Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street, and writer at Jesuit Social Services. Reproduced with the author's permission.

Thus, Catholic teaching about conflict condemns direct attacks on civilians or even the disproportionate killing of civilians as collateral damage in an attack on a military target.

In other words, you cannot blow up a 10-story apartment building to kill a terrorist.

The same is true of politics. You may have very good goals, but you also must look at the political muscle employed in attaining those goals and ask if the end justifies the means.

You need to ask, for example, what is the collateral damage caused by the tactics you use in gaining your objective.

The bishops waged a long war against Roe v. Wade and won this past June in the form of Justice Samuel Alito's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.

It would be difficult to find any bishop who thinks that this war was not justified. Some bishops, however, do question some of the tactics employed in this war — for example, denying Communion to pro-choice Democrats.

As the bishops gather in Baltimore next week for their fall meeting, will they acknowledge the collateral damage caused by their tactics?

I am not talking about the negative impact of the decision as perceived by those who are pro-choice. Pro-choice advocates argue that the lives and health of women are being put at risk by the decision.

Bishops and pro-life advocates deny these charges.

But even those who see no problems with the Dobbs decision need to ask about the collateral damage caused by the strategy used by the bishops and their pro-life allies.

The pro-life strategy was simple: Support presidential and senatorial candidates who would put justices on the U.S. Supreme Court in order to overturn Roe.

In current American politics, that meant supporting Republican candidates.

Thus, by making abortion their "preeminent priority," the bishops made Donald Trump and the Republican Party their allies.

Killed Roe; but what else?

The Republicans, as promised, successfully killed Roe, but what else did they kill?

The Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe also gutted the Voting Rights Act that protected the rights of Black and other minority voters. They also invalidated environmental and other business regulations. This term it appears they look ready to cast aside affirmative action programs.

All of this is collateral damage from the bishops' decision to support stacking the court with conservative justices who would overturn Roe.

Republican legislators, meanwhile, have opposed almost every proposal that would have implemented Catholic social teaching.

They have opposed laws and regulations to deal with global warming. They ignore the warnings of scientists and Secretary-General António Guterres who warns, "We are on a highway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator." The devastation that will be caused by global warming by the end of this century will be apocalyptic.

The earth and humanity are collateral damage from the decision of bishops to ally themselves with the Republican Party to defeat Roe.

Republicans also called for closing the border to refugees and immigrants.

Salvadoran and Haitian families fleeing the threat of gangs, Venezuelans escaping a Communist dictatorship and believers running from religious persecution: All are to be turned away by this country where almost all our ancestors were immigrants.

If the Holy Family crossed our border, we would send them back to Bethlehem and King Herod.

Migrants and refugees are collateral damage to the bishops' decision to back Republicans to overturn Roe.

Republicans have also voted against programs aimed at helping the poor: the expansion of Medicaid, the child tax credit, increases in the minimum wage and nutritional and housing programs. Republicans prefer massive tax cuts that mostly benefit the rich.

The poor are collateral damage to the bishops' decision to back Republicans to overturn Roe.

Former President Donald Trump, who appointed the justices who made the Dobbs decision possible, has also made American politics more polarized and even violent.

His refusal to accept the 2020 election results is a threat to democracy. He has turned the Republican Party, the party of fiscal conservatives, into the party that does not accept election results unless they win.

Democracy is collateral damage to the bishops' decision to support Republicans who would overturn Roe.

There is even a chance that the anti-abortion cause itself may be collateral damage to the alliance with Republicans.

Most voters in the midterm elections opposed Dobbs.

They voted against the bishops on every ballot measure dealing with abortion. Many candidates who opposed abortion without exceptions were also defeated.

The bishops will argue they did not endorse this collateral damage and, therefore should not be blamed for it.

But if you arm an ally who says he will use the arms to kill civilians, then you have to accept blame for their deaths.

The Republicans were never shy in proclaiming what they would do if they gained power.

To the extent that the bishops and pro-lifers helped the Republicans gain power, they must accept responsibility for what the Republicans did with that power.

In wars, generals always ignore or play down collateral damage as part of the cost of winning.

The bishops will do the same when they meet in Baltimore next week. They may even believe that this collateral damage was an acceptable cost of overturning Roe.

But as they celebrate their victory in Dobbs, they cannot ignore their responsibility for the collateral damage that came from their alliance with the Republican Party.

They must also consider how to make up for this damage.

• Thomas Reese SJ is a senior analyst at Religion News Service, and a former columnist at National Catholic Reporter, and a former editor-in-chief of the weekly Catholic magazine America. First published in RNS. Republished with permission.

ANSA stated the Pope mentioned this at a recent meeting of the organising council of the synod of bishops.

"But how to develop a strong initiative in favour of global peace is what might most interest in this moment the Pope, who has for a long time had in mind to find ways to address himself to other religions for a significant commitment capable of saying 'no for always' to war," the report stated.

ANSA added that other proposals for topics included ecumenism and the possibility of more married priests.

The permanent organising council of the Vatican's synod office met in Rome on April 18-19.

A Vatican conference last month held by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and Pax Christi International issued an appeal for a reconsideration of just war theory in Catholic teaching.

Some 80 participants from around the world stated that the Church's just war teachings have too often been used to justify violent conflicts.

The group also called for Francis to consider writing an encyclical on the topic.

While synods do not typically result in papal encyclical letters, they are often followed by publication of a papal apostolic exhortation, such as Francis' recent exhortation Amoris Laetitia.

The head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Cardinal Peter Turkson, said in an interview the proposals from the conference were "legitimate".

"In the worldwide Catholic network, it is an important voice among many."

"Pope Francis is working for collegiality, following the teaching of Vatican Council II," said the cardinal.

"It will be of utmost importance to initiate a broad, open, qualified, deeply felt and widespread debate. A possible encyclical is plausible only as the fruit of much dialogue, not as a starting point."

In recent years, the Vatican has called for international force to be used to stop acts of genocide by ISIS.

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Crux
• Image: National Catholic Register

Cardinal Peter Turkson said proposals to drop the concept of just war were "legitimate".

He called for a "broad and deeply felt" debate on the question of just war theory.

"A possible encyclical is plausible only as the fruit of much dialogue, not as a starting point," he said.

Continue reading

Eighty experts engaged in global non-violent struggles have gathered this week to develop a new moral framework that rejects ethical justifications for war.

They also hope Pope Francis's next excyclical will be on peacemaking, and that it will pick up their concerns.

The conference from April 11 to 13 is being co-hosted by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and Pax Christi International.

Terrence Rynne, a US theologian who is attending the event, said he considers it "phenomenally important".

"Coming out of it, Pope Francis might see his way clear to articulate a fresh vision of peacemaking to the Church," said Rynne.

Conference organisers said that just war teaching "can no longer claim centre stage as the Christian approach to war and peace".

"After more than 1500 years and repeated use of the just war criteria to sanction war rather than to prevent war, the Catholic Church, like many other Christian communities, is rereading the text of Jesus' life and re-appropriating the Christian vocation of pro-active peacemaking," they stated.

"Emphasising the need to work for a just peace, the Church is moving away from the acceptability of calling war 'just'," they continued.

"While clear ethical criteria are necessary for addressing egregious attacks or threats in a violent world, moral theologians and ethicists should no longer refer to such criteria as the 'just war theory', because that language undermines the moral imperative to develop tools and capacity for nonviolent conflict."

As part of their goals for the conference, organisers state they seek a "new articulation of Catholic teaching on war and peace, including explicit rejection of 'just war' language".

They state that they want "an alternative ethical framework for engaging acute conflict and atrocities by developing the themes and practices of nonviolent conflict transformation and just peace".

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: World for Travel

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