Philosophy/Politics: The Justice of War

I believe deeply in the sacredness of life; it’s why I’m a vegetarian, it’s why I’m against abortion, it’s why I oppose the death penalty. It is also what inclines me towards pacifism, but I find myself unable to call myself a pacifist.

War is horrendous. Death reigns, atrocities are committed. No matter how robust our notions of just war, there is something about the act of war that makes us forget our humanity. Even World War II, that epitomous symbol of just war, saw much evil on both sides. The Nazis had to be defeated. They were murdering human beings by the millions. The Japanese empire wasn’t any better. And yet, the Allies share their own sins – Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, internment camps, to name a few.

Inevitably, our justifications for war end up treating human lives as mere statistics. Ten can die that a thousand might live. More would have died if we hadn’t nuked Japan. This sort of think, to me, is abhorrent. It treats life as a strategic resource.

War assumes a genuine separation of us and them. It feeds on tribalism. Your people attacked our people, so we will avenge ourselves on you.

Pacifism also makes sense to me as a Christian. The Christian way is to conquer through submission, to love even our enemies.

Yet, there is another side to the issue. I recently read a post railing against pacifism. The post itself was quite deplorable. It treated pacifism as a sort of childish immorality. It acted as if this were some kind of easy question. Yet, something was said which carries a lot of weight for me. It is the same argument that holds me back from pacifism every time I hear it. It talked about the current situation in the Middle East. Civilians are rioting, trying to overthrow tyrants, and are being brutally beat down. Those who cannot defend themselves are being subjected to terrible violence, and we have the power to do something about it. Is it not an ethical duty for the strong to defend the weak?

I think it’s something of an illusion to think that any war has actually been fought for these reasons, but it remains at least a theoretical possibility, and one that strongly compels. At the very least, wars not fought for these reasons have had these results.

This makes becoming a pacifist a difficult, if not impossible, choice for me, but it doesn’t negate what was said at the beginning of this post. War is wicked and evil. War treats life as a matter of statistics, of us and them. But war also allows the strong to defend the weak.

In the end, I find myself befuddled. Either way I go seems to me a great evil, and I do not know how to decide between them.

Life: Reading Augustine

St. Augustine is one of the great thinkers of the Christian Church. I do not always agree with him, but there is no denying his wisdom, intelligent and fervor for God. One of the things I have decided to do during this coming season of Lent is to read St. Augustine's Confessions.

The Confessions is a cherished book of both theology and philosophy. It is also, I understand, the world's first autobiography.

As I read this text, I will post here my reflections, and I hope you will join me on the journey.

Theology: Ash Wednesday and the Meaning of Sin

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. - Book of Common Prayer

One day, a man went out and bought a car. It was a beautiful car, fast and reliable too. The man would drive that car everywhere, and he loved it dearly. With time though, the car stopped running so well, it's brakes began to slip, it became a danger.

Sin is like the degradation of that car. Like the car, man was made for a purpose, created with a specific kind of life he was meant to live. But the First Man fell from that purpose, he degenerated and all his decedents after him. And this is where the analogy with the car breaks down, for it was, in the first place, a choice that led to the Fall. But sin is not a legal term, we are not thinking good and evil in terms of adherence to a law. Sin means missing the mark. Sin is falling from what we were created to be, and oftentimes, like the brakes on the car, that degeneracy becomes a danger to others.

So thorough does this degeneracy of sin run in the human race, so actual is its effect on us, that we cannot help ourselves. We have died spiritually and cannot return to what we were meant to be. God could have left us in that state, let us degenerate further, destroy ourselves, but instead He, in the person of the Son, became a man, and as a man He submitted to death and through Resurrection He conquered the power of sin and death.

Through this act, those who call on the name of Christ are sealed for the Resurrection. They are given an eternal inheritance, and the promise that at the last day they shall be raised with Christ. This healing is already breaking out in the world, but it is not yet complete. Though the seed of salvation is in us, we still live in a fallen world where inevitably we miss the mark.

Today is Ash Wednesday, it is the beginning of the season of Lent on the church calendar. During Lent, Christians around the world enter into a time of fasting, beginning on this day with the imposition of the ashes. These ashes symbolize the old Near Eastern practice of mourning in sackcloth and ashes.  To some, this may seem an odd tradition for Christians to practice. We have been forgiven, washed of our sins and given the guarantee of the Resurrection.

Yet, this season exists for a reason. Again, sin is not to be understood in a legal sense. Sin is degeneracy. And though in our spirits (our eternal nature) we are made new, yet still we live in the flesh (our corruptible nature). Because of this, we enter Lent as a time of mourning. We memorialize those who went before Christ, who lived in a time before He was raised from the dead, we remember our own lives apart from God, we bewail that we are still yet living this side of the Resurrection.

There is another purpose too, for though we are still in the Flesh, the Spirit is in us and we can grow. We will never attain perfection before we are made whole, but we can work to make ourselves and our world more like the Kingdom of Heaven. One day, Heaven shall be wedded to Earth, and the Kingdom work done in the here and now shall endure. As we fast during Lent, one of the things we do is discipline ourselves. We train ourselves in temperance and charity by fasting and reminding ourselves of our own faults. By God's grace, this work helps to transform our lives for the better, than we might be a blessing unto others. And all along, as we fast, we pray, and God answers.

I hope you join with me in this season of Lent. Fast, mourn, look towards Easter with hope, pray for the world around you, serve and be transformed.

Book Review: The Accidental Anglican

The Accidental Anglican by Bishop Todd Hunter


I have some bias in reading this book. Todd is my pastor and my bishop, and I love and admire him in both roles, so am inclined to appreciate what he brings to the table. Still, his other books, while very good, have not stood out to me. This one, however, as an account of Todd's journey into the Anglican communion stands above the rest. Todd's story is a unique and beautiful one, going from Cavalry Chapel roots, through the Vineyard and the emerging church, Todd has accumulated a lot of church experience. What I love most of all is his willingness to sing the praises of where he came from, even has he has moved beyond it. There is no bitterness here. Truly, Todd is representative of the "sweet reasonableness" he praises Anglicanism for.

Book Review: How Should We Then Live? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture

How Should We Then Live? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture by Francis Schaeffer



In some ways this isn't a fair review. It isn't fair because I simply skimmed through the book (how I came to do that is a story for another time). Still, I feel that skimming gave me a pretty good idea of the book, and it's not a very positive one.

There's no denying that Schaeffer is intelligent, in that he attempts to tackle all of Western civilization, and has obviously tried to gain a vast knowledge of it. The problem is that most of his understanding of what he has approached is wrong.

His analysis is also reductive. He seems to see all of human history as some sort of battle between placing God at the center of our worldview, or putting Man there.

The problem with this is that's it's horribly reductive. Things are far more complicated than this, and in forcing them into this mold they often become terribly distorted. For example, the question of the relationship between particulars and universals that was of great importance in Medieval Philosophy is somehow made into a quest to find meaning (i.e. purpose) for particulars, when it was a linguistic and metaphysical inquiry.

Also, God became man. This destroys his paradigm.

Philosophy: Smart Phones and Space

I love technology, computers especially. That isn't to say I'm the world's biggest tech geek, not by a long shot, but I'm a fan. I don't always rush out and buy the latest thing, but if I could afford it I probably would.

But I gave up my smart phone. Not only that, but I don't plan on ever having one again.

Don't get me wrong, I loved my smart phone. I loved being able to access the internet anywhere, play cool games, and all the like. It was an awesome toy, even if it wasn't the best smart phone, but something about it started to disturb me.

One of the things about human nature that I find incredible is our embodiment. Of course, this is something we often take for granted, and sometimes distance ourselves from, but it's an undeniable fact. We are bodies, we exist in a place and a time, and I think being present to that is immensely important. As I used my smart phone, I felt my connection to space and time slipping. I was always connected to the internet, I could always check my email or Facebook. Anytime I wondered about any random fact, Wikipedia was just a swipe of the finger away. These things in themselves were perfectly fine, but the accompanying loss of spatial and temporal presentness I felt was deeply disturbing to me.

Art: Nova Corps/Green Lantern Crossover

It's been awhile since I've posted any art up here, so it seemed about time. A friend of mine has been having me read Marvel Cosmic's Annihilation Event, which features the Nova Corps. Nova Corps is kind of like DC Comic's Green Lantern Corps, and so I was inspired to draw this crossover picture. I started with images of Green Lantern and Nova which I traced, modified a little, and colored.