Tonight the instructor began by reviewing the major themes of Catholic Social Teaching, and continued with a discussion about the economics of war and peace. Our understanding of the dignity of the human person comes from Genesis where our capacity to choose good or evil (right and wrong), or the way of life and way of death is first explored. For Christians, eternal life is a sharing of the Love of God and doing the Will of God. It is also detaching ourselves from the things that draw us away from God, while at the same time becoming one in spirit.
It’s important to recognize that the Kingdom of God is not some future reality. The Gospel of Mark begins with the proclamation that the Kingdom of God is among you; his message is that it is here and now, in the person of Jesus, the risen Christ. How we living our lives (not necessarily what we are doing at any given moment) is striving to do God's will. We are building the Kingdom of God, living our lives the way we believe others would want to live their lives. While we're struggling with real challenges, we believe that the Kingdom of God is present in each of us, as the Body of Christ.
Christ is present in the church and the Church is all those who proclaim that Jesus died on the cross and that He rose that we might have eternal life. The tension between the kingdom that is promised and the kingdom that is present is caused by sin, which distorts the reality of our lives. The reality of sin is that is negatively affects others, and moves us away from the Kingdom of God. If sin is equated with our temporal reality, then what is the source of evil in the world? At the bottom line, sin enters the world through the choices we make. I read recently that the Devil cannot enter the world by himself, that he is only able to affect our world through our actions and our thoughts. In effect, sin enters the world through us.
Heaven and Hell are not simply future realities then, but are instead present realities. The kingdom (of God) is not just a personal relationship with Jesus; it must be expressed in community and it must be experienced here and now. It is experienced within our relationships, and sometimes in our wider realities, in Christ in the present and the future. The Kingdom of God is here and now and it is always present, but it is negatively affected where the dignity of man is compromised, where poverty, violence, and sin has more sway than God's grace, where people live without hope, and where people believe that hatred is more powerful than love. Our body and soul are not separate (as in the worldly view) but are one.
Thomas Aquinas struggled with the moral implications of war. During the Medieval Ages, war was hand to hand and face to face combat, between communities; rarely involving the outside world. Saint Thomas was considering the choices that were made during war as he developed his Just War Theory (Jus ad Bellem), which actually means Justice to War. He was really trying to recognize the appropriate behavior during war, not when it was appropriate to enter a war. He was addressing questions such as who had the authority to declare war, what the right intention of war might be, and whether it was a just cause, along with questions about the probability of success, and proportionality. Thomas Aquinas was asking how violence (destruction of people and chaos in society) could be limited during war. Unfortunately, his Just War Theory is being used as justification for when to go to war.
At the beginning of the Gulf War as Kuwait was invaded they lobbied the United States saying they were our friends and that they had something we needed, and if we didn’t come to their aid our economy would fail. Their solution was war because the bad guys were over-running an independent country. George W. Bush went to the United Nations saying “we must do something”. The questions relating to the Gulf War, such as just cause, competent authority, right intention, last resort, proportionality and probability of success, are the kinds of questions that Thomas Aquinas was trying to discern. In this case our response was overwhelming force destroying the aggressor nation. In Afghanistan and Iraq the death toll has been far greater than the US death toll. This shouldn’t be a war against Afghanistan (and Iraq) because we are fighting a non-state ideology (terrorism).
A nation has a right to defend itself, of course, but identifying the enemy is becoming more difficult. We seem to conclude that we can only respond to violence with violence, but even with increased globalization does the US have the right to wage war against another nation and then lie about the reasons? American exceptionalism thinks that it is right to impose or bring our sense of right and wrong to the world. Is it right to wage war that targets civilians? Is war God's will? Does there come a time when human history is so distorted and disordered that violent uprising is an appropriate response? What are the implications of armed uprising verses mediated response verses passivism? Our instructor’s personal opinion is that Jesus himself was a pacifist. A true pacifist cannot raise a hand in violence, even in the face of violence.
What is the message of Jesus turning the other cheek? To be struck with the back of a hand was to say that you are not human. Turning the other cheek would force the aggressor to use the palm of the hand, which would acknowledge that you are human. Dust to dust and ashes to ashes is not the end, it's the beginning. Jesus was an active pacifist, like Gandhi and Martin Luther Ling who followed this same example. Just war theory must be based on the idea of limiting death and sacrifice. What expression of pacifism will work within a specific culture?
In Socialism the state exists to support the collective. Human labor is the source of production. The perfect society can only be accomplished with revolution. This perfect society has never been achieved because those that throw off the oppressors with revolution become the oppressors. The human person becomes subordinate to the collective. The ideal of Capitalism is to get ahead. The American dream is providing for oneself and one’s family, with the right to self-determination, and the accumulation of wealth and fame. The fallacy of equality is that while the opportunity is equal the outcome is not equal. The motivating factor in Capitalism is profit and the strategy is market. The argument is that if we maximize profit then everyone will succeed.
The Church does not identify itself with either Socialism or Capitalism. The Church has a view of a perfect society where there are no needs, although the idea of a perfect society shouldn't be confused with socialism. Health care is not a privilege; it's an obligation that society has in caring for its citizens. The mystery of Jesus was that he was able to enter into the suffering of those he met, and how we understand this is in our understanding of the world around us, which comes to us via our experiences.
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