No War Is Holy

Our faith demands a moral opposition to Trump and Hegseth’s Crusade

Two weeks into Trump’s illegal war of choice in the Middle East, his regime’s initial claim of an imminent nuclear threat has morphed into a call for regime change in Iran, only to shift again this week to a call for allies who’ve been shut out of American foreign policy to join a coalition to defend the global economy. No doubt, billions of people’s lives are imperiled by the stranglehold on the Straight of Hormuz in this season when the world’s farmers await the nitrogen fertilizer they need to ensure crop yields later this year. But Trump’s call for help has gone unanswered.

After promising to end America’s forever wars, Trump has dragged the United States and the world into another unnecessary war without any clear aim and thus without any end point in sight. His “peace through strength” approach to foreign policy has destroyed alliances and left America’s military isolated. He left the nuclear agreement that the Obama administration had negotiated only to then claim that he had to attack Iran because there was no treaty. The Commander in Chief of the US military has demonstrated that he does not understand the stakes of the decisions only he is in a position to make.

Screenshot of March 5th meeting of religious nationalists in the Oval Office

In the Bible Jesus says, “Suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace.” Jesus made the point by way of analogy, teaching that those who would follow his Way would have to count the cost as any political leader does. Jesus assumed a common sense among political rulers, but Trump’s actions suggest that something has replaced the logic of common self-interest for him. He is asking Americans to take it on faith that this war is good - to believe in spite of the rising death toll, spiking gas prices, and growing cries of people whose lives have been upended.

Such faith is madness. The Union general William Tecumseh Sherman noted a similar insanity among the Confederate leadership during America’s Civil War. “You people of the South don’t know what you are doing. This country will be drenched in blood, and God only knows how it will end. It is all folly, madness, a crime against civilization! You people speak so lightly of war; you don’t know what you’re talking about. War is a terrible thing!”

Indeed. We are plunged headlong into a storm that consumes the lives of school girls in Iran one day, of a Christian priest in Lebanon the next. US soldiers are sacrificed, then dishonored on the tarmac at Andrews Airforce Base. The stories we know are precious few as the death toll rises beyond what we can comprehend. The carnage proliferates; the madness abounds.

Pope Francis said, “ War ruins everything, even the bonds between brothers. War is irrational; its only plan is to bring destruction; it seeks to grow by destroying.” By all reports, the American people do not want this war. Yet it continues, and Republican leadership in Congress will not stop it. The generals advising Trump have not stopped it. While their are some signs of dissension within the MAGA ranks, this murderous crusade continues because the people around Trump continue to bow to his immoral demands.

We must be clear as Christian preachers and teachers that this war is only possible because of a distortion of our faith. A movement of religious nationalists who misuse and abuse Christianity has laid the groundwork for a holy war. From this war’s first days, Pete Hegseth declared that “crazy regimes like Iran” are “hell-bent on prophetic Islamist delusions.” This is the same Pete Hegseth who, before he was in charge of the US military, had a symbol from the Crusades of the Middle Ages tattooed on his chest and wrote a book called American Crusade. Adherents of this movement are a minority in the US and in the American church, but they currently hold power over the Republican Party and the US government. Their misplaced religious zeal threatens us all.

Now, more than ever, Christian teachers must be clear that, while there is a range of Christian teachings on pacifism and just war, faith in Christ requires a rejection of religious violence. To worship the God we know in Jesus is to confess that no war is holy. Even when Christian theology has argued that violence is necessary to defend our neighbors or to prevent a greater evil, the church’s just war doctrine does not sanctify violence. It limits it.

Jesus, the life of the world, submitted to death on a cross in order to end the cycle of redemptive violence for all creation. His cross proclaims that the world is not saved by violence; it is redeemed by self-giving love. That Christians in many times and places have failed to live this truth does not diminish its centrality to our faith. In this season of Lent, when we confess our sins, we must both name how we’ve been led astray and turn away from the path that leads to destruction.

Even when we can’t yet see a clear way toward peace, faith demands that we confess clearly: no war is holy. Christians do not put our hope in bombs and destruction.