Just War (3)

Some thoughts from Lee Camp, a professor at Lipscomb University:

Particularly in our modern era, seldom has the just war tradition worked in practice. Few "just war Christians" have ever used the criteria to actually decide whether they would or would not fight in a particular war. In fact, I find few among my students who have ever heard a single sermon on the just war tradition. We have a vague assumption that it is legitimate to fight in certain wars, but we do not train ourselves to make the discerning judgments required. Most often, the just war tradition appears to be empty rhetoric. Even when the bishops conclude that a given situation is not legitimated by the just war tradition, the church as a whole appears unprepared to make the moral stand necessary against a government steadfastly preparing to wage war.