In a comment to the previous post, Michael Westmoreland-White asks a fair question of Just War theory:

Has JWT EVER led to massive civil disobedience and refusal to fight on the part of a church’s members? Pacifists have often been arrested or executed for refusing to fight. When has this been true of JWTers? CAN the doctrine be given “teeth” or will it always just be a sop to the consciences of nationalistic warriors?

The reason this is an important question is that, if the only effect of JWT is to bless whatever wars the government undertakes, then it’s not functioning as a theory of the morality of warfare. And I think it’s fair to say that many American Christians have gone along with the state’s war plans while using the rhetoric of just war more as a fig leaf than as a critical tool. Both the mainline and evangelical churches have been guilty of buying into forms of nationalism that serve to blunt criticism of the government’s actions, especially during wartime. It’s also worth pointing out that the vast majority of Christians aren’t taking to the street to engage in civil disobedience in protest of any of the other great evils our society is complicit in, whether that be abortion, poverty, ecological degradation, or what have you.

Still, it has to be pointed out that many Christians, both clergy and laypeople, who have protested war have done so for broadly Just War reasons. Unless we’re going to assume, for instance, that everyone who protested the Vietnam war was a committed pacifist, there must’ve been at least some cases where opposition was motivated by people concluding that the war didn’t meet the standards of a just war. And I think it’s safe to say that this has been the case in more recent years as well. The mainline churches, none of which are officially pacifist, have been very critical of the Iraq war and many of their members took part in demonstrations protesting it. Granting all that, though, it’s safe to say, I think, that JWT doesn’t provide the controlling template for how most American Christians think about war.

Whether or not JWT can become more effective as a genuine restraint on Christians’ willingness to participate in unjust wars depends, I think, on whether it can be effectively taught. My evidence is strictly anecdotal, but my impression is that JWT is rarely taught or discussed in most congregations. No moral framework can be put into practice if it isn’t taught and received. And this is true of any morality. Sexual morality doesn’t require abstinence in all cases, but it does require the practice of restraint and discrimination, as well as the development of virtues necessary for that practice. Likewise, putting JWT into practice means not just learning a theory, but also learning the virtues of restraint, moderation, and justice as well as faith, hope, and charity. That it hasn’t been taught and internalized isn’t necessarily a knock against the theory, but a knock against us. If mainline chruches are serious about JWT, maybe a first step would be to learn from the peace churches how they reinforce and inculcate the practices of peacemaking in their members.