“It is a virtuous act to take up arms in defense of the nation against an unjust aggressor,” writes Father Gerald Murray, one of the foremost Catholic thinkers in America and an expert on the Catholic Church’s “Just War Doctrine,” in The Free Press.
Pope Leo XIV believes otherwise. His very public back-and-forth with Donald Trump about the Iran War has captured headlines for both men, but the theological argument of right and wrong, moral vs. immoral, has been neglected.
Trump was apparently miffed at the pontiff pontificating on the Iran War and let him have it with both barrels on Truth Social.
I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nuclear Weapon. I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s terrible that America attacked Venezuela, a Country that was sending massive amounts of Drugs into the United States and, even worse, emptying their prisons, including murderers, drug dealers, and killers, into our Country.
Leo responded, “I don’t want to get into a debate with him [Trump],” the U.S.-born pope said. “I don’t think that the message of the Gospel is meant to be abused in the way that some people are doing.”
Except he did get into a debate with Trump, which is a very unseemly thing for the Vicar of Christ to do.
To my way of thinking, Leo is taking the easy way out. To claim that war is “evil” is a no-brainer, and that the gospel is a “pure-as-the-driven-snow” representation of the words of Jesus Christ is missing the point. Jesus was a pacifist, yes, but he also realized that men live in a violent, brutal world. He advocated standing up to injustice. In the real world, that means fighting. The Catholic Church has recognized that reality almost from its founding.
“Woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic and political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth,” Leo said in Cameroon. “It is a world turned upside down, an exploitation of God’s creation that must be denounced and rejected by every honest conscience.”
The Catholic Church and previous popes have been very good at that. Not just the Crusades, but religious wars against protestants were cheered on by various popes. The “Just War Doctrine” has been abused in the past by power-hungry pontiffs who dragged “that which is sacred into darkness and filth.”
What is considered a “just war”?
The two Americans negotiating via proxies with Iran, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, have absolutely no illusions about invoking the “just war” principle in this case.
“Both Iranian negotiators said to us directly with, you know, no shame, that they controlled 460 kilograms of 60 percent [enriched uranium] and they’re aware that that could make 11 nuclear bombs, and that was the beginning of their negotiating stance,” Witkoff told Fox News.
As an aside, there is no commercial use whatsoever for uranium enriched to 60%. Nuclear reactors use uranium enriched to 3-5%. Some medical uses for enriched uranium require 10% enrichment. The only reason to possess uranium enriched to 60% is that it would take only about a week to enrich the stock to 90%. That’s bomb grade material.
Witkoff continued: “Jared and I opened up with the Iranian negotiators telling us they had the inalienable right to enrich all their nuclear fuel that they possessed.”
By any stretch of the imagination, that’s a nuclear threat. While Leo is stuck with his pieities and “moral high ground,” Iran threatens the U.S. and its allies with annihilation. If there was ever a justification for fighting a war, this is it.
What is the “Just War Doctrine”?
The theory has its origins in the writings of St. Augustine, and has been developed by theologians over the centuries, notably by St. Thomas Aquinas. War between nations is a consequence of original sin, which introduced disorder into human life and society. Wars of aggression are plainly immoral, but taking up arms to oppose aggression is just. Love of neighbor at times requires such use of deadly force.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that governments have the right to engage in “legitimate defense by military force” in response to aggression that is “lasting, grave, and certain” when “all other means to putting an end to it . . . have been shown to be impractical or ineffective.”
The initiation of defensive hostilities, the Catechism continues, must have “serious prospects of success” and “the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.”
Thus far, the war in Iran satisfies these tests.
J.D. Vance said after the failed negotiations in Pakistan last weekend, “We need to see an affirmative commitment that they will not seek a nuclear weapon, and that they will not seek the tools, that would enable them to quickly achieve a nuclear weapon. That is the core goal of the president of the United States.”
Leo is not blind. He knows Iran is a danger not just to its own people but to the entire human race. But he’s frozen by a weak and unmuscular theology that accepts the conventional wisdom that the Vatican must oppose every war for any reason whatsoever because “peace” demands it.
Yes, if Leo backed the U.S. efforts to eliminate Iran’s nuclear threat, he would be accused of being a toady to the U.S. and, worse, a friend of Donald Trump. His American nationality would be thrown in his face, and he’d be skewered from one end of the planet to the other.
It would take a pope with guts and courage. Leo falls short in both departments.
The justice of the United States attack on Iran is confirmed by the Iranian regime’s admissions. A nuclear-armed Iran with ballistic missiles is an imminent threat to the United States, Israel, and many other countries. The advanced state of uranium enrichment meant that the United States and Israel faced an imminent threat. The clear intent of the Iranian regime to build nuclear weapons has not changed. Given that, it was just for the United States and Israel to attack Iran in order to eliminate the nuclear threat.
Negotiations with Iran were proven to be a fruitless path toward eliminating its nuclear threat. Military action by the United States was justified by the gravity of the peril posed by the Iranian regime. Protecting the United States and her allies by military means clearly fulfills the conditions for a just war.
I can’t help thinking what the pope who endured decades of living under first the Nazis and then Communism would have thought of the Iran War? In all his 26 years as pope, John Paul II always advocated standing up to evil on principle. I think his response to the Iran War would have been far different than Pope Leo XIV.
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