Here is Cardinal Ratzinger quoted in the Avvenire, September 21, 2002, p. 25
The following question was directly asked of Card. Ratzinger. Does the Iraq War have a moral justification? "In this situation, certainly not," answered the Cardinal. "There is the United Nations. That is the proper authority for making the decisive choice. It is necessary for the community of peoples to decide, not an individual power. And the fact that the United Nations are looking for a way to avoid war seems to me to demonstrate sufficiently that the damage would be greater than the values that one seeks to save." The Cardinal did not hide his conviction that "the UN can be criticized" from various points of view, but "it is the instrument created after the war to provide a coordination, also from the moral standpoint, of politics," he pointed out. The journalists continued to press him, asking the Prefect of the Congregation of Faith if the Catechism of the Catholic Church permits "preventive war" in exceptional cases. "The concept of preventive war does not appear in the Catechism," Ratzinger stated, adding in clarification, "We cannot simply say that the Catechism does not justify war, but it is true that the Catechism has developed a doctrine which on one hand does not deny that there are values and populations that must be defended, in certain circumstances, and on the other proposes a very precise doctrine on the limits of these possibilities."
2 comments:
I obviously have great respect for B16; as I've told people, there was no one I'd prefer as JPII's successor.
That said, I have some problems with his reasoning on this, at least with some of the things he's said in the quote David offered.
For instance, the issue of the UN being the proper authority... the authority of the UN is purely consensual... it isn't a moral authority per se. What if there was a clear instance in which it would be legit for a nation to act militarily, yet the UNSC refused to grant its approval. Does that mean that the military action would be immoral? Of course not.
I have a hard time understanding why JP2 & B16 don't see the element of realpolitik at work here... in light of what we've learned about the relationship between France & Iraq and China & Iraq, can we reasonably think that their opposition to the war was motivated by moral principle?
The fact is, the UN and the UNSC can fail, as B16 seems to recognize. It seems to me that they did just that vis-a-vis Iraq.
As far as the Catechism is concerned, I'd refer again to the Johnson article from First Things. I can't imagine that B16 means that the CCC covers just war doctrine in complete, exacting detail.
These are very insightful comments Chris, thank you. I agree with you. Hindsight is 20/20. At the time of decision to enter the war, every intelligence agency in the world thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Afterwards we find out that this maybe wasn't true. We really don't know. And the whole oil for money scandal definitely tarnished the credibility of the UN & France.
And I agree with you that the Just War reference in the CCC sets only the bare minimum standards. An interesting note in regards to the production of the CCC is that this section on the Just War Theory was one of the most hotly debated topics of everything in the CCC. There was only consensus on this very small part and that's why it's so minimal.
One might add as well that it's only a "theory" and not doctrine per se. Even if it was, one has to apply it to specific matters (people, location, time, etc.), which is a prudential decision. In case of war, this clearly lays in the hands of the political and military leaders (laymen) who have this expertise. Therein lies the reason why we must pray for them.
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