Must All Christians Be Pacifists?

The following originally appeared as an IRD Weekly E-Newsletter. If you would like to receive future mailings, register as an IRD User today.

Find additional newsletters in the IRD E-Newsletter Archive.

Are all Christians commanded to be pacifists? Many of our church elites think so. One prominent Methodist theologian who insists on absolute pacifism is Duke Seminary’s Stanley Hauerwas, who says he wants to be as “toxic” as Jeremiah Wright. Here’s my article on Hauerwas’ latest outburst, which condemned President Obama’s troop surge in Afghanistan.

The vast bulk of Christian tradition supports Just War teaching, heeding St. Paul’s admonition in Romans 13 that God has armed the state with the “sword” to resist injustice. Complete non-violence would require not only rejecting military but also all police powers. Indeed, all government is based on some level of force. Complete pacifism would lead to anarchy. But seminary professors like Hauerwas, and the church elites who follow them, are often more interested in political posturing than serious church moral teaching.

Another example is Chuck Gutenson, a former professor at Methodist Asbury Seminary and now working for Religious Left activist Jim Wallis’s Sojourners. Gutenson defended a virtually unrestricted welfare state as biblically ordained in a recent column. Here’s my response. Again, the church pacifists do not seem to understand that exploiting the government to forcibly seize money from one group to redistribute it to another is hardly non-coercive. Sadly, these Religious Left advocates refuse to admit the tremendous human destruction that uncontrolled welfarism inflicts wherever it is imposed. Many of these activists think good intentions are more important than results. But shouldn’t Christians be concerned about results also?

Speaking of results, many advocates of accommodating Sudan’s Islamist regime seem unconcerned about them.   Here’s Faith McDonnell’s article. Many voices in both the churches and the government would prefer to ignore the extreme and murderous form of Islam which governs that oppressed nation. Instead, they naively, or at least unrealistically, want to trust in good will. Please pray for the Church in Sudan, which wonderfully grows and tragically suffers at the same time.

Anglicans in Sudan are especially numerous and courageous. Meanwhile, U.S. Episcopalians are often neither. The Los Angeles Diocese has elected the Anglican Communion’s first lesbian bishop. Now the whole denomination must ratify her election. Read Jeff Walton’s article here. And here’s our news release.

Meanwhile, the fall-out continues from a liberal Episcopal priest in Massachusetts whose new report condescendingly alleges that IRD “manipulates” African Christians to espouse biblical beliefs about sexual ethics. Read Faith’s article here.

Finally, you’ve read about the latest Climategate scandals involving Global Warming. Evangelical scholars and scientists are speaking out against extreme Global Warming alarmism. Please check out Connor Ewing’s article here.

This year is quickly ending. Thanks to your prayers and help, IRD has been greatly blessed in 2009. We’ve defending biblical orthodoxy and traditional marriage, summoned the Mainline churches to reform, implored Evangelicals not to repeat the liberal mistakes of Mainliners, advocated vigorously on behalf of persecuted Christians around the world, warned against the dangers of radical Islam, and reminded all churches of their larger social responsibilities.

Do you support IRD’s ministry of accountability and church reform? Do you share our hope for our churches’ future? If so, please consider a generous end of the year donation. Your gift of $25, $50, $100 or more will help ensure that IRD will aggressively move into 2010 advocating on your behalf within the churches. You can quickly donate online here.