Yep.

I’m glad you find it helpful. Thank you for your anecdote. Another time when the link between the Eucharist and the Church becomes particularly clear is when one faces the possibility of an awkward sign of peace. If we cannot wish someone peace, the Lord clearly tells us that we must leave our offering outside the temple.

Brett, did you come up with that yourself? If I use it, and I expect I’ll want to, I want to get the attribution right.

Along the line of needing to be reminded . . . I remember one Holy Thursday when there was a big crowd of people outside the chapel of repose where I had attended mass, and I was grumbling to myself about my inability to get near the Sacrament, when a tiny/huge voice spoke to my heart, reminding me that all these people “in the way” were each members of the same Body of Christ I supposedly wanted to get close to …

R

This is might sound a little silly, but since the age of 16 I’ve considered myself on a personal crusade for the truth. Six years later, I can see more clearly now that the name is perhaps a bit much. I guess I’ll just have to come up with a new one :) .

I suppose the name “Crusader” is violence positive in a perhaps unsettling way as it directly correlates with a portion of our historical patrimony most of us would generally prefer to be without, if we could make such a choice. As for whether or not the name is itself something I should go without, I would say that that depends on the crusade of which I consider myself a part. Also, I myself am new to Vox Nova, so this name is simply a screen name I chose for posting here.

Now, I simply follow the mind of the Church as closely as I can on the matters we are discussing. As far as I can tell that means permitting war in certain very restricted circumstances. Just war theory can never be viewed or abused as a sort of blank check for accomplishing one’s military and political objectives.

I will be the first to admit that I myself abused the just war criteria. When I was in high school and the Iraq War started I quickly became a cheerleader for the effort. I was young, impressionable, and a Republican through familial influence. So I fell for it. My thinking now is: never again will I make the same mistake.

As to your second point, I suppose your are right that we all tend to have a prejudice for our own tribes. I’ve made that mistake myself in the past, and I am hoping not to make it again. Hence why I am reading this blog.

I’m a little new around Vox-Nova, so I don’t know whether this is a name you’ve used before, or you picked it for the occasion of discussing “just” and “unjust” violence. Your choice of name communicates a more violence-positive attitude than a name like “White Dove” would.

The greatest danger in theories of justification — whether of war or any other behavior that might “ordinarily” be characterized as evil — is the natural human tendency to favorably prejudge whatever I identify myself with. It is natural to assume that my country’s military endeavors and my church’s political alliances are “just” until proved otherwise.

Just saying,…

Crusader–I would recommend John Howard Yoder’s recent (posthumously released) book “Christian Attitudes to War, Peace and Revolution.” He, though a pacifist, took just war theory very seriously and thought the two were interrelated. A very even-handed look at the theory.

Ryan – He may have called himself a pacifist somewhere. I’m not sure. He certainly did oppose the Iraq War but one need not be a pacifist to come to that (obvious) judgment. And no, the Church has never condemned pacifism. On the contrary, the Church has affirmed pacifism.