Innocents of War

Guest editorial: Michael Shackleton – Battlefields and graveyards mark the historical evidence of war in all parts of the world, our own among them. They are grim monuments to man’s inhumanity to man and the subsequent impact on political and social change over the centuries.

The global centenary of the start of World War I, observed last month, has stimulated our recognition of the sacrifice of the young lives cruelly stamped out in that battle and all battles since. This newspaper, like many others that then reflected on the horror of armed conflict, considered how the Church’s attitude to the concept of a just war is losing ground.

Battlefields and graveyards do not sufficiently cause us to grasp the reality of the countless unarmed civilians who were slaughtered in what is cynically referred to as collateral damage. This reality is now being highlighted by the modern Church.

Going to war implies involvement in what St John Paul II called the culture of death.

He contrasted this with the accentuation of the gospel of life, which carries with it the upholding of life in the womb and even in terminal sickness.

While world leaders wrangle over a lasting peace in the Middle East and a military way of combating the barbaric terrorism of the Islamic State, Christians have no choice but to stick to the principle of making and preserving peace.

John Paul II, we are told, angrily warned British prime minister Tony Blair not to join with the United States in invading Iraq in 2003. He indicated the consequences which had not been adequately analysed or appreciated. He wanted negotiations, not acts of aggression.

These consequences were not only geopolitical. The pope was thinking of the civilians who would be killed, injured and displaced.

As innocent non-combatants, their plight appeared to be secondary or unconsidered by the potentates of military might. No plans were made to rehabilitate them.

Since then the Church’s concern for civilians in war-torn regions has grown. The sheer injustice that rips families apart and destroys their homes and livelihoods is something that must attract our attention today.

Pope Francis has entreated world leaders to prefer dialogue and reconciliation to the call to arms. He has pointedly told them that they should think of the sorrow that their children will suffer from warfare.

Hardness of heart and insensitivity to those hundreds of thousands of refugees who traipse forlornly from the security of their homes into the unknown, ill becomes the Christian conscience.

There are numerous organisations, Christian and otherwise, that are ready to ease the pain and to search for new homes for the victims of war.

However, justice would seem to demand that the nations that caused the innocent to endure such hardships should contribute to a programme of rehabilitation and recovery. Unfortunately, that is hardly likely when the innocent are considered to be the enemy.

The Church attempts to rationalise warfare as a consequence of our human condition, our fallen nature in need of redemption. Vatican II provided this insight: Insofar as men are sinful, the threat of war hangs over them, and hang over them it will until the return of Christ (Gaudium et spes, 78).

Yet we as followers of the Prince of Peace have to demonstrate to those in power that they should extend themselves to exercise restraint when the threat of war hangs over them.

Peace-making is far more difficult than warmongering. It takes courage and steadfastness to turn from violence when confronted with looming bloodshed.

In the words of Pope Paul VI when addressing the United Nations General Assembly in 1965: Peace expresses itself only in peace, a peace which is not separate from the demands of justice but which is fostered by personal sacrifice, clemency, mercy and love.

Self-interest hardens hearts. Compassion for others softens hearts and flows towards a peaceful order among peoples and families everywhere.