In light of the many violent conflicts around the world involving people of different faith traditions -- Christians, Muslims, Jews, and others -- what's the difference between Christianity and other religions when it comes to making decisions about war? 

T.D.  New Haven, CT

Despite the political tensions which divide Christian, Jewish, and Islamic communities from one another, the three faiths have a lot in common in the way they think about the use of force. Of course, each includes a range of positions, from pacifist or mystical traditions that reject war to more militant views that seem easily stirred to violence. What Christianity, Judaism, and Islam share, however, is a broad mainstream in each faith that views war as always regrettable, sometimes necessary, and permissible only under certain conditions.

Key among those conditions is that the faithful do not use violence to advance their personal ends or to enrich themselves. If force is to be used, it must be to relieve those who are oppressed or to defend the community of faith from aggression. The war, once begun, must serve those ends and be disciplined by those purposes, so that random acts of vengeance and excessive violence are not permitted. In Christianity, these ideas are summed up in the doctrine of the "just war," which must be fought for the right reasons, using the right means.

Islam and Judaism, for a variety of historical reasons, have nothing exactly like the Christian just war concept, but similar insights and principles are articulated by religious and legal authorities in various places in those traditions, too. Also, leaders in all three faiths have accepted the growing body of international law that governs the conduct of war, the treatment of enemy combatants, and the protection of non-combatant civilians.

Why, then, is there so much violence that has a religious tinge to it in the world today? Part of the reason is that faith is very basic to a person's identity. What an outsider sees as neutral or "secular" may seem to a person of faith like a direct attack on his or her faith. Ways of doing business, styles of humor or artistic expression, and the way people dress all provide occasions for these conflicts, and in a world with increasing global interaction and religious diversity, we can expect to see more of them. Leaders in business, journalism, and the arts, as well as in government, need to cultivate sensitivity to these differences and find ways to accommodate faith, rather than challenge it. We Americans do this pretty well in our domestic political life, despite some controversies, but we have a long way to go in thinking about it globally. It's easy to recognize a "faith-based initiative" when it comes in a familiar form and supports our civic values, but some of us are tone-deaf to faith when it's singing a different tune from the ones we know.

Knowing the potential for religious conflict, some people conclude that the solution is to keep faith private and exclude religion from politics and diplomacy. But the same traditions that sometime authorize war also talk about respecting others who live their faith in peace and integrity. If you try to prevent war by isolating politics from religion, you may also cut yourself off from one of the most important sources of peace. Christian, Jewish, and Muslim leaders have made that point in American life, but we're still looking for religious and political leaders who can connect faith to peace and mutual respect on the global level.

For further reading on Islam from a Western, Christian perspective, see  Islam and War:  A Study in Comparative Ethics by John Kelsay (Westminster John Knox Press, 1993).