Pope John Paul II’s Centesimus Annus: Chris Reichman

Susan B. Thistlethwaite, former president of the Chicago Theological Seminary, writes:

"St. Augustine looked at the horrors barbarian invaders were inflicting on the Roman citizens and he asked himself if a Christian could ever justify going to war. He answered a very qualified 'yes.' A Christian can go to war if it is to 'defend the vulnerable other.' His version didn't even include self-defense."

More than 1500 years later, in 1991, Pope John Paul II issued his encyclical letter in which he declared: "I myself, on the occasion of the recent tragic war in the Persian Gulf, repeated the cry: "Never again war!" No, never again war, which destroys the lives of innocent people, teaches how to kill, throws into upheaval even the lives of those who do the killing and leaves behind a trail of resentment and hatred, thus making it all the more difficult to find a just solution of the very problems which provoked the war."