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Does Haurwas have something?

Perhaps; but I'm not sure just what. I've done some research, but his definitive theological beliefs are not clearly set forth on any site thus far. It IS claer that he is a pacifist, and if my guess is correct, he is also quite liberal theologically. We'll just have to see. Exactly where is he on the theological spectrum?

As far as pacifism is concerned; I agree that Christians should always oft for peace in every circumstance - as far as possible: which does not include when a just war is demanded for the survivial of the national entity.

Making defensive war is not only biblically warranted, but ethically mandatory. Since the Iraq war is being waged in defense of our nation in view of a masasive and dealy incursion by the Muslim forces into our territory, we are perfectly right and bouond by duty to reply militarily. Reasoning with such people is utterly futile and insane.

We are not talking about interpersonal ethics (love thy neighbor and turn the other cheek) but international terrorism - one of the most horrendous and vicious means of killing and maiming innocent civilians ever devised.

But as I have said before, I have real questions about the tactical worth of the Iraq invasion, but not about out national justification to root out and destroy the perpetrators of the raw violence and death of terrorism.

And because the iraq venture was a less than optimal tactical maneuver, it is now getting to be untenable and increasingly a liability - counter-oriduction in the large war on terror. But those who cannot discern between interpersonal ethical dynamics and national survival are simply blinded by asceticism, choosing inner religious strokes and false piety over the survival of their nation.

I know, it's a complex issue, but burying our heads in the sand of pacifism will bring us nothing but defeat and oblivion in the face of the Isalmo-fascists. On the other hand, a trigger happy militarism, minus biblical understanding will also work against us. Well- played and restrained military action will bring us a measure of military effectiveness; but only the Gospel and the application of bliblcal principles in all of life will insure future security and peace on earth.

nIkoS,
very nicely stated and i am in total agreement.

sign me, also a bond servant...................

Most of these thoughts flow from the recent Greensboro lecture of Duke Divinity School Professor of Theological Ethics, Stanley Hauerwas. I am still trying to absorb Hauerwas from my position as a progressive Christian/Buddhist/Quaker, or whatever the hell I am. Hauerwas knocks me right off my comfortable seat and turns me upside down. He like MacIntyre is a critic of "liberalism." Most all post-Enlightenment thought is thought in defense of "liberalism."

Hauerwas is an orthodox Christian who is a strong pacifist, opposes abortion, opposes euthanasia, opposes the retreat from suffering, and criticizes the post-Enlightenment virtue of "individual rights" and "individual liberties" that have replaced the concept of the Christian community or any concept of "community." He is a strong critic of the "religious right" and the "progressive religious left." He fits into no box but ultimately along with Alasdair MacIntyre thinks we are in a period of "barbarism" and have been in such a crisis for well over a century. He finds support and some hope in the works of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, John Howard Yoder and Alasdair MacIntyre.

Hauerwas is one of the few who was not surprised by the recent beautiful Christian witness of the Mennonite, Amish community because they live in a world that rejects modernity and takes seriously the Sermon on the Mount. The Amish response of love and forgiveness was not done because it is "successful" or "a way of dealing with grief" but out of their essential witness to Christ. They could respond in no other way because of their Christian beliefs and because they are a "Christian Community." Also they are not "liberals" and they are not consummed with post-Enlightenment thinking of "individual liberty."

Hauerwas said the Left and the Right have both used the "Christian Church" to push their political agendas. Hauerwas said that the witness required to be faithful to Christ has nothing to do with political agendas, politics or the nation state. Christianity has become so secularized for many that "love" and "duty" for country is the real religion that is worshiped. The "Flag" has become a sacred symbol and it did so for America during the Civil War. Honoring our war dead has become our central religious act (secular worship of the State) since the Civil War. And this ongoing reverence for war has become our essential history.

We eagerly chose war over any other options -- it unites us, it feeds our souls. The pre-Enlightenment church took a very different approach because soldiers were not allowed to enter the "Church" or participant in the Eucharist for at least three years because the act of war and killing was a "sin." In our post-Enlightenment world it is not a "sin" but is peddled by the "State" and accepted by us as a virtue. War lifts us above our pettiness and provides meaning.

Hauerwas said -- Our lives have become such that war is the essential force that give life meaning. War is not really about the "military industrial complex", it is not about Capitalism, it is not about "a plan to seize oil" ( here he says the Left, like the Right, do not have a clue what war actually is) but it is the glue that holds America and other nation-states together. The "State" requires us to honor War and even when we disengage like in Korea or Vietnam we can never say as a country "this war was wrong" because in so doing we acknowledge "the State" was wrong. The "State" is our secular God -- God cannot be wrong.

The "State" is always trying to turn religion into the secular, goose bump producing "love and defense of my country." It has worked well in Europe and America and it is now working well in the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

The Christian religion (and I think some other religions) is/are an alternative to the secular worship of the "State."

Hauerwas is strange to us all. He speaks another language and turns Christianity on its head. He said as a pacifist he always hears -- "some of us have to fight for your freedoms so you, you little self-righteous shit, can go around spewing your nonsense about pacifism." One of Hauerwas' good pieces on the web is -- http://www.ctinquiry.org/publications/reflections_volume_6/hauerwas.htm