Dominica, the publication of the Dominican students of the St. Joseph Province, features Br. Bonaventure Chapman, O.P. weighing in on Stanley Hauerwas’ pacifism:
Although I am not a pacifist, there are certainly compelling reasons for being one. In the first place, Jesus seems to recommend the practice on a number of occasions, as when he refuses permission to James and John to call down fire from heaven to consume the Samaritan town that rejected Jesus (Luke 9:51-56); or when he rebukes Peter in the Garden and heals the servant whose ear had been cut off (Luke 22:47-53). Most powerfully, Jesus refuses to call down angels to save him before Pilate and, instead, suffers crucifixion for the sins of the world. This act of non-violence is what saves the world from sin and death, and it is this act that Hauerwas argues should be the paradigm for all Christian practice…This emphasis on martyrdom as the Christian practice is echoed by Hauerwas: “I really believe, since I’m a Christian, that you always live in a world at risk. Indeed, what Christianity is about, is always learning how to die early for the right reasons.”
In contrast, he also cites C.S. Lewis’ short piece, “Why I am not a Pacifist,”
“[In trying to become a pacifist,] I should find a very doubtful factual basis, an obscure train of reasoning, a weight of authority both human and Divine against me, and strong grounds for suspecting that my wishes had directed my decision . . . It may be, after all, that Pacifism is right. But it seems to me very long odds, longer odds than I would care to take with the voice of almost all humanity against me.”
Eric Cohen’s review of Hauerwas’ new book War and the American Difference: Theological Reflections on Violence and National Identity can be found in First Things’ April issue here.
May 21st, 2012 | 7:47 pm
In “Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis very briefly voices his support for Christians in combat….Lewis goes on to imagine drawing a bead on a German soldier who is simultaneously aiming a rifle at him, and as eternity claims them both, they embrace in heaven. Now I, too, can imagine this happening, but it has nothing to do with the question of whether a Christian should have been there on the military battlefield in the first place. [Lewis wrote this many years after he became a Christian, long after his service in WWI in which he was wounded.] Providentially for us, C.S. Lewis lived through the Great War and the world is much the richer.”
quoted in:
http://www.amazon.com/Christian-Pacifism-Fruit-Narrow-ebook/dp/B005RIKH62/ref=la_B001KMODGY_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1337400507&sr=1-4
May 21st, 2012 | 11:19 pm
Some food for thought from Stanley Hauerwas’ book:
“I hope, therefore, that my attempt to (re)describe war as an alternative to the sacrifice of the cross at once illumines why war is so morally compelling and why the church is an alternative to war.”
“War is a moral necessity for America…” it “is America’s central liturgical act…”
“I fear that the American version of Christianity cannot provide a political challenge to what is done in the name of the American difference.”
Nor do many American Christians have any awareness of the roots of pacifism in church history and in Scripture. Many take pacifism as some sort of betrayal of all they hold dear.
May 21st, 2012 | 11:26 pm
But why would Peter be carrying a sword in the first place if there was never an occasion when it would have been right to use? Jesus himself said that his followers would have been fighting to defend him if his kingdom were of this world…
May 22nd, 2012 | 2:10 am
The problem with pacifism is that peace is not necessarily a virtue. (I am not talking about the ‘peace’ of God.)
North Korea, for example, is quite peaceful right now. It is also, arguably, the largest concentration camp in the world.
Before the Civil War, many plantations were peaceful–no, not every slave owner was Simon Legree–but I doubt you could get many African slaves to agree that their condition was the best of all possible worlds.
Peace in and of itself is no damned good unless it is accompanied by freedom.
May 22nd, 2012 | 7:12 am
I seem to remember Christ speaking to a soldier or two and he never told them to quit their jobs.
May 22nd, 2012 | 8:24 am
Little Gidding
Perhaps, because Jesus said “he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one” [Lk 22:36]
May 22nd, 2012 | 9:24 am
Many take pacifism as some sort of betrayal of all they hold dear.
Do you believe the world would be a better place if the Jews had been completely eradicated from the face of the earth?
The pacifists’ advice during World War II was what discredited pacifism. If they’d been more influential, there wouldn’t be any Jewish people in the world today.
May 22nd, 2012 | 10:14 am
Little Gidding –
In Catholic iconography, saints are sometimes shown carrying the implement of their martyrdom. You’ll see the same thing with other saints – Lawrence with a grill, Catherine with a wheel, etc. and some very graphic depictions of torture, such as St. Lucy holding her eyes on a platter. Just as we show Christ with a cross, not because he endorsed crucifying others, but because he himself was crucified.
So it is St. Paul is traditionally shown with a sword because tradition says he was beheaded.
St. Peter, in contrast, is usually shown carrying two big keys, symbolizing the authority to judge sins and thus entry into heaven.(whose sins you have forgiven will be forgiven, and whose sins you hold will be held). Of course, I don’t believe Protestants show him with these keys, but they are very prominent in Catholic ones. I don’t recall ever seeing him with a sword, but perhaps I’ve missed something.
May 22nd, 2012 | 12:08 pm
Sallyr
Which is why the arms of the City of London have a sword in pale, point upwards, in the first quarter and the arms of the diocese of London have a pair of crossed swords. St Paul’s is the cathedral church of London.
If you look at the inn sign in an English village, it is usually possible to guess the dedication of the parish church – The Crossed Keys = St Peter’s, the Angel = St Matthew’s, the Red Lion = St Mark’s, the Bull = St Luke’s, the Bird & Baby (Eagle & Child) = St John the Evangelist, the Lamb & Flag = St John Baptist &c, &c. There are many others.
May 22nd, 2012 | 3:24 pm
Perhaps Little Gidding is referring to the incident when Peter took his sword and cut off Malchus’ ear.
May 22nd, 2012 | 4:19 pm
I don’t think Hauerwas’s larger argument is right: I don’t think that Christian societies must be pacifist. But I think any Christian must be humbled by those societies such as the Amish or the Mennonite who decide to be pacifist, and I find Hauerwas a chastising and rewarding thinker. He understands the Christian mystery as few do, and he’s absolutely right about Americans’ desire for blood. War does feel to us like a moral necessity, and we’re wrong to perceive it in that way. It’s a shame that Hauerwas and First Things parted company over the Iraq War. The magazine lost a strong, moral voice.
May 22nd, 2012 | 11:30 pm
As always, there are trivial comments that completely miss the point of Christian pacifism.
For one who would care to be informed on the topic, whether he agrees with the conclusion or not, a good starting place would be C. John Cadoux’s The Early Christian Attitude to War [free on the internet].
May 23rd, 2012 | 8:27 am
Though my acquaintanceship with Hauerwas is very light, I was struck with how little his writings of meekness and Christ-like humility matched his public persona. As a lecturer, I found him to be something of a loud mouth and bully, brash and boorish in speech with an ever-present “ain’t I a stinker” grin. I would have best described him as a provocateur.
I have been told that he has tempered that as of late. The odd juxtaposition certainly struck me at the time, however.
May 23rd, 2012 | 9:58 am
But I think any Christian must be humbled by those societies such as the Amish or the Mennonite who decide to be pacifist
I do not think it is noble to refuse to stand up for others when they are threatened or oppressed, so I do not see why it is that I should be humbled by the Amish or the Mennonite on this score.
We must do what is right, and if it were self-evident what that means, there would be no disagreement among Christians of good faith. When Jesus tells us to ‘turn the other cheek’, what is he asking us to do? I think everyone agrees it means we are to forgive rather than seek revenge; also that we are to forgive rather than be obsessive about counting our grievances and protecting our interests. But does that mean we should do nothing in the face of evil?
Just how far are we to trust God and just where are we to be God’s tools ourselves?
We have an obligation to protect what is good. I do not know where the line is between protecting a thing vs. being aggressive on its behalf. But taking a simplistic position – one that entails a willingness to sacrifice other peoples’ children casually – is not IMO something I owe respect to.
May 23rd, 2012 | 10:01 am
I have been directed to this comment (emphasis mine):
May 24th, 2012 | 11:50 am
Blake brings up the old bugaboo: In relation to the late war, one question that every pacifist had a clear obligation toanswer was: “What about the Jews? Are you prepared to see them exterminated? …
It presupposes, wrongly, that ‘we’ went to war to save the Jews. It is blind to the actual history of WWII but also to the foundation that Christians prepared Hitler in WWI.
As to ‘plan B’ as opposed to ‘war,’ there were many like Corry Ten Boom’s family.
May 24th, 2012 | 5:14 pm
It presupposes, wrongly, that ‘we’ went to war to save the Jews
No, it doesn’t.
You can use what Gandhi wrote about Pearl Harbor instead, if you like. You still don’t have an answer.
Pacifism inescapably requires that we let aggression go unchecked.
The ethically correct response when one is confronted with bullying is to intervene on behalf of the victim. Standing on the sidelines doing nothing is not virtuous.
And if it turns out that the bully you stop turns out to be a far more horrific bully than you knew at the time when you stepped in – if it turns out that this bully was in fact doing unbelievably ghastly things – how does that change anything? It doesn’t. It just proves that you were right to step in.
And finding concentration camps full of various persecuted minorities – finding that the Nazis were worse than we thought – proves that we were right to ignore the pacifists.
Gandhi’s advice to the Jews still stands as evidence that pacifism is both stupid and evil.
May 25th, 2012 | 9:12 pm
As a Mennonite, a comment in response to Michael and Blake.
Not all Mennonites believe that their position can be accurately described as “pacifism”. Another position–which has a theological pedigree going all the way back to the Schleitheim Confession of 1527–is that Mennonites recognize the right of the state to bear the sword, but are to be separated from all aspects of the world’s political and social life, including the use of the sword.
I for one do not regard this as pacifism, which has always been a *worldly* attempt to gain the same fundamental goals of political-social action, but “peacefully.” (See the OED, Supplement, s.v. “pacifism” on this point.) Whether or not pacifism is possible or desirable is another question, but in my considered opinion is NOT an accurate description for the position of the Schleitheim Confession, or the historical experience and practice of the Mennonite Church up to, say, 1970.
May 29th, 2012 | 9:40 pm
David,
Thanks for the reminder. There are a range of beliefs, attitudes, and practices that can be described as pacifist, and different “pacifist” groups have embraced various combinations. But broadly speaking, there’s a difference between the Christian “pacifism” of the Mennonites and the “God and Country” Christianity so often in evidence here on First Things.
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