The Virtue of War

Answer

The Virtue of War

Global conflicts and wars have become a reality for every nation, developed, developing, and underdeveloped with the scope of the war ranging from the physical attack on national sovereignty to cybervandals. Terrorist attacks have, in most cases, led to retaliation by the attacked nations, which has, in some instances, sparked wars. The war outbreaks and retaliations come from the government's desire to protect its sovereignty and make a politically correct statement. In such situations, there has been significant concern about Christianity's role in the morality of war. According to Webster & Cole, under the divided Christendom chapter of their book, the Virtue of War, the concept of strict separation between the state and the Church can be very misleading. This makes it essential to examine Christianity's position on the morality of war across the globe.

Webster & Cole asserts that the desire to defend the people of God from unjust aggression remains the driving force for the Christian warrior. This presumes that in situations when the war's primary objective is to defend the people of God from unjust aggression and attacks, then the course of the war is justifiable (Webster & Cole, 2004). This arises from the examination of the course and morality of war from the standpoint of Eastern Orthodoxy. The Orthodox Church holds that war is sometimes justifiable through an examination of the Holy Scriptures, the practice of the early Church, the sentiments of Orthodox saints, and the writings of various church leaders. Therefore, there are situations when Christians can actively participate in the war because it is morally right to do so. Furthermore, the Orthodox Church substantially recognizes soldiers' ability to display virtue despite the usual requirement for soldiers to undergo penance before receiving the "holy mysteries" of the Church.

However, I believe that Christians are called to be soldiers in the army of Christ. The Church has no position to embrace a radical approach in civil matters and issues involving the state. Christians are called to maintain a significantly high level of morality and become an example to other people through their life and actions, irrespective of the pagan views (Webster & Cole, 2004). Therefore, the assertions of the justifiability of war have a limited scope. This is because Eastern Orthodoxy's teaching of the morality of war is based only on two trajectories; the experience of ancient Israel in the Old Testament and absolute pacifism.

Moreover, their definition of the people of God does not extend beyond the Orthodox Church, which presents significant challenges in developing a holistic conceptualization of Christianity and religion in general. In essence, the sentiments seemed to support the Iraq war because the country is supposedly hospitable to criminals and terror groups. It is further interesting to realize that Orthodoxy's definition of the Church does not incorporate the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestants. Therefore, rather than calling for a crusade against Iraq and the purported militia groups, the Church should warn of the global attacks and seek peace as a medium of bringing nations together and winning souls for Christ. As Dunlap, 2016 points out, not every attack, whether digital or physical, requires retaliation and military aggression. Olasky, 2016, further presumes that God could be working in mysterious ways in such situations. Such makes me disagree with the assertion made by the authors of "The Virtue of War." Without any cooperation between the state and the Church, a government's call on war cannot entirely be justifiable.

References

Dunlap, C. J. D. (2016). “Cybervandalism” or “Digital act of war”? America’s muddled approach to cyber incidents won’t deter more crises.

Olasky, M. (2016). Does God do cyber warfare?

Webster, A. F., & Cole, D. (2004). The virtue of war: Reclaiming the classic christian traditions east and west. Regina Orthodox Press.

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