That’s part of what I’m talking about. Common sense also tells us that (before the Second Coming, if the person is Christian) the way you deal with violence is to return it with violence.

Please do not read this as a defense of war – we should certainly hope and pray for an end to all war – but we shouldn’t be surprised when it doesn’t go away.

We need to do more than hope and pray, in my opinion. We must not participate, and we must demand an end to it, no matter how difficult (impossible?) ending war will be. We also, I think, shouldn’t be surprised that war will not go away (as you say) when we shrug our shoulders and participate.

I must say that I really do appreciate the sentiment that motivates your arguments.

Thanks! Good to hear.

I agree with the sentiment and basic idea of your second paragraph. It would be easier to end the war than to end legalized abortion in the United States. I shouldn’t have implied it was the other way around.

I don’t think, however, that common sense allows for the perpetual defense of war. I do think that common sense tells us that war isn’t going anywhere fast, short of the Second Coming. Please do not read this as a defense of war – we should certainly hope and pray for an end to all war – but we shouldn’t be surprised when it doesn’t go away. Also, it’s not not going away because we recognize Original Sin has had terrible consequences on what is possible for humanity this side of paradise.

I must say that I really do appreciate the sentiment that motivates your arguments.

Even if we use your numbers rationale, I am not convinced that abortion is therefore “more pressing” or “more within our reach to solve.” Wars are usually started as a matter of concrete, immediate decision-making which mobilize millions of people to participate and support it. The fact is, if the Bush administration had had serious opposition from Catholics, the Iraq would have been well within our “reach” to solve, by not participating, by fiercely opposing it, by denying Bush the means to start the war. It was an immediately solvable situation. Abortion, of course, is not like that.

And again, with regard to your use of numbers, I am not convinced that by simple numbers that abortion is more widespread than war, because it is hardly a simple task to tally up the victims of wars, as I noted above.

Amen! I’m glad to see this too…

I was trying to defend the common sense idea that some problems are more important than other problems – more pressing. Some problems are also more within our reach to solve. As someone who believes in basic democratic ideas and the notion of self-governance, I must insist this common sense idea is important. Indeed, democracy would be impossible without it.

With regards to the magnitude comments I made – I guess if you call observing the sheer difference in number of murders “some detached, privileged place” then yeah, that’s where the observation comes from. If you think using statistics in making a judgment is playing God, then I suppose I am guilty of playing God and for that I am sorry.

But let me be clear – I’m not trying to make an excuse or tell people who are victims of war that their problems aren’t real or significant or horrible – I’m quite aware they are. I know that war is a horror. The point is not to defend or explain away the horrors of war.

But I wish we could have this conversation in person! I think we could come to understand each other.

And for full disclosure, I do not and have not supported the war in Iraq and think there is a very strong case to be made against it.

Here we see the “distinction” mentality of explaining away concern for war at work. This is another distinction that baffles me. First, judging the “magnitude” of war is damn near impossible, as it does not include simple battlefield deaths, the impact of war spans generations, and the question of who gets to decide what “counts” as a “war.” Not to mention other factors. Second, it is really easy for a safe male in the united states to say that abortion is the “more prevalent sin” when compared to war. Tell that to people in the midst of ongoing conflicts whose children are not killed, by choice, privately in a clinic, but by bombs produced by your u.s. tax dollars. Who are you to judge what the “more prevalent sin” is, as if from some detached, privileged place of God-like observation? The arrogance! I’m sorry, but I’m certain your “distinction” here is rendered meaningless if you take a posture of real solidarity with the victims of both types of killing.

I think where we disagree is that I think reasonable people can disagree about whether or not Iraq is just, as long as they work to inform their consciences with the teachings of the Church.

Theoretically, yes, but this simply cannot account for the vast majority of u.s. Catholic soldiers who participate and the silence of the rest of us who explain away that silence by shifting attention over and over to the equally important sin of abortion.

To be frank, I think you are not being fair to people who think opposition to the war is not as practically important as working to enact pro-life legislation.

As Catholics, WE DO NOT HAVE TO CHOOSE — AND WE MUST NOT CHOOSE — WHICH ISSUE IS MORE IMPORTANT. We MUST oppose both abortion and war. It’s not a competition.

These people are not war lovers – at least the faithful Catholics you speak of – they have concerns for justice just like you do.

You know as well as I do that many so-called “faithful” Catholics see very little problem with the wars waged by the united states, including the Iraq War. Some perhaps have a twisted understanding of “justice.”

Even if it seems like they are totally insane, can’t you at least recognize they do not have evil intentions? And the fact that they exist and argue the way they do is not scary – it’s their attempt to know what the truth of things is. Why demean people like this?

Although Poli used the word “scary,” I agree with it. And I do not mean to “demean” anyone, only to speak the truth as I understand it. I do believe that the intention of some Catholics, with regard to war, is indeed evil, even if this is not a willful, conscious embrace of some abstract thing called “evil.”

I am always open to a reasonable case, but I cannot even imagine any possible argument for the moral legitimacy of the Iraq War based upon BOTH just war doctrine AND the Church’s interpretation and application of that doctrine in the specific context of Iraq.

To be frank, I think you are not being fair to people who think opposition to the war is not as practically important as working to enact pro-life legislation.

But here you press the question beyond moral weight and into the legal sphere where priority and importance may shift on the issues. I think that’s fair to go there, but it wasn’t specifically what was at stake in this conversation.

Even if it seems like they are totally insane, can’t you at least recognize they do not have evil intentions?

I do recognize their non-evil intentions (I hesitate to label them unqualifiably “good”). I also recognize the non-evil intentions of many (not all) women who have abortions. But intentions can be purified by reason in both cases.

And the fact that they exist and argue the way they do is not scary – it’s their attempt to know what the truth of things is. Why demean people like this?

What I meant by “scary” was the thought of the death of every human on account of an unjust war. That’s a horribly torturing image in moral terms, akin to the image of slaughter of humans in abortions clinics.

I think where we disagree is that I think reasonable people can disagree about whether or not Iraq is just, as long as they work to inform their consciences with the teachings of the Church.

I also don’t think it is nonsense to distinguish between the scope of the problem of war and the scope of the problem of abortion. Abortion kills roughly 4000 people a day in the United States alone. 4000 a day! The number is not insignificant.

The act of abortion is not intrinsically any more or less evil than the act of an unjust war, but the magnitude of the problem of abortion is greater than the magnitude of the problem of the war – as things stand today. Abortion is a more prevalent sin.

Obviously, ideally, neither ought to exist, but we have to work with reality, not our ideals. This is not to say we should not work to the ideal – of course we should – I think I disagree with you about how we should work to the ideals of no war and no abortion.

To be frank, I think you are not being fair to people who think opposition to the war is not as practically important as working to enact pro-life legislation. These people are not war lovers – at least the faithful Catholics you speak of – they have concerns for justice just like you do. Even if it seems like they are totally insane, can’t you at least recognize they do not have evil intentions? And the fact that they exist and argue the way they do is not scary – it’s their attempt to know what the truth of things is. Why demean people like this?

And this is a scary reality.

But I do find it odd that you know people who think it’s somehow different!

It’s not so odd. Think of all the Catholics who tolerate the war in Iraq citing a “distinction”: that abortion is a greater evil. You have to have heard this nonsense before. Unjust killing is unjust killing.

I think we have gotten somewhere with our conversation (at least the two of us, one with another). “We still can’t convince each other of the proper means” I think it a legitimate way of pointing out things. And if we kept it that way, it will do well for everyone. We might passionately disagree on how things should be done, and it is right to debate it, and even debate why we might think some ways should be avoided. However, I think the concern many of us have is when this translates into politics and using political views and positions as a way to suggest someone shouldn’t be fit for communion. If that wasn’t brought into the equation, unless someone was clearly in formal cooperation with an intrinsic evil (and not a questionable cooperation which can be debated), I think political debates will greatly improve among Catholics.