The United Methodist Council of Bishops concluded its fall meeting by issuing a pastoral letter in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11 and the war against terrorism.
A quick read of the pastoral letter might see it as just a brief, measured statement with several concerns and directives for how we should pray. However, a more careful reading leaves one disappointed, both at what it said and at what it didn’t say. And learning what got cut from the original draft only adds to one’s distress.
Around the same time, a pastoral message was issued by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. There is a striking contrast between the two in terms of theological and intellectual substance. The UM pastoral is woefully weak in comparison to the thoughtful, substantive statement of the U.S. Catholic Bishops. One wonders if UM bishops have not somehow lost touch with more than a millennium of church teaching, having become disconnected from what Richard Neuhaus calls "the Great Tradition of Christian thought"—specifically in just war doctrine.
In terms of things said, the bishops’ pastoral makes the stunning claim that "violence in all its forms and expressions is contrary to God’s purpose for the world." One blinks with astonishment at this claim! Were this to be true, there would be no place for a nation’s armed forces or for that matter, a community’s police force. Swiss theologian Emil Brunner has written, "To deny on ethical grounds the elementary right of the state to defend itself by war simply means to deny the existence of the state itself. Pacifism of the absolutist variety is practical anarchy."
The original draft of the letter, aptly prepared by Bishop Joe Pennel of Virginia, condemned terrorism by saying, "Terrorism in all its forms and expressions is contrary to God’s dream for the world." That would have been a welcomed statement. However, Bishop Joe Sprague of Northern Illinois suggested the phrase be changed from "terrorism" to "violence" and changed the statement to: "violence in all of its forms and expressions is contrary to God’s purpose for the world." Unfortunately, the suggested change by Bishop Sprague, a pacifist, drastically altered the meaning of the entire pastoral letter. I am surprised that other bishops didn’t protest this egregious change.
This statement from the UM bishops was released two days before Veterans Day—a day set aside to honor and thank the men and women who valiantly put their lives in the line of fire to ensure our freedoms in this country. Can you imagine reading the statement from the UM bishops to a group of World War II veterans? Their chief pastors would have been saying to them that what they did to end Nazism was "contrary to God’s purpose for the world."
Then, there are important things not said in the UM pastoral. The original draft cited the Social Principles from The Book of Discipline, which acknowledge that "most Christians regretfully realize that, when peaceful alternatives have failed, the force of arms may be preferable to unchecked aggression, tyranny and genocide" (Par. 164.G). Unfortunately, this was cut from the final draft. The original also referred to the horrific events of September 11 as a "shattering evil." The final letter made no mention of "evil." Though several bishops asked that prayers for the U.S. military be included, the final draft makes no reference to our armed forces (except chaplains), requesting prayer rather for people "placed in harm’s way and their loved ones." Our bishops seemed unwilling to ask prayer specifically for "the U.S. armed forces."
Sadly, there was little passion or sense of outrage in our bishops’ letter. The Catholic bishops’ message, by contrast, is not dispassionate. It refers to "those who committed these atrocities" (and that is what the events of September 11 were—atrocities, not merely "sad and terrible events" as the UM bishops say). The Catholic leaders insist, "The dreadful deeds of September 11 cannot go unanswered." And again, "We acknowledge…the right and duty of a nation and the international community to use military force if necessary to defend the common good…" They add that this must be done according to sound moral principles, the norms of the just war tradition.
For centuries, the Christian Church has taught that the governing authority is "the servant of God to execute wrath on the wrongdoer" (Rom. 13:5). Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, and others have believed that Christians could and should join in exercising civil authority. To do so was to fulfill the church’s teaching that government is instituted by God to punish the wrongdoer, reward and protect the good, and preserve peace.
In this important teaching, Richard Neuhaus notes that just war "is not itself an evil; nor is it even, as is commonly said today, a necessary evil. It is, if just, a positive duty, the doing of which, while it may entail much suffering, is to be counted as a good."
TThe omission of any reference to just war in the bishops’ pastoral, at this time in our nation’s history, is a serious, even embarrassing, omission.