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The need to listen carefully to our critics is nowhere more obvious to me than in our Christian dealings with the topic of violence. That subject has consistently been high on my own agenda during my career as an ethicist. My entry level concerns on this subject were shaped by my very personal struggles during the Vietnam War era. And while I have always found a thoroughgoing pacifism to have some moral attraction, my basic convictions on the subject have been consistently formed and expressed within a Just War perspective. I have never been happy, though, with the way many Just War theorists have concentrated almost exclusively on the patterns and processes of military strategy, to the neglect of the more general patterns of violence and abuse in human relations. My own sense is that it is especially important to pay close attention to is sues of moral character, a focus that clearly comes to the fore as we think about the very urgent question of what it means for us to address the crisis of our increasingly violent culture.

I have regularly drawn my inspiration on this topic from John Calvin. In his comments in the Institutes about the use of military violence, he links Just War considerations to underlying issues of spirituality. When civic leaders are planning military actions, Calvin says,

it is the duty of all magistrates here to guard particularly against giving vent to their passions even in the slightest degree. Rather, if they have to punish, let them not be carried away with headlong anger, or be seized with hatred, or burn with implacable severity. Let them also (as Augustine says) have pity on the common nature in the one whose special fault they are punishing. Or, if they must arm themselves against the enemy, that is, the armed robber, let them not lightly seek occasion to do so; indeed, let them not accept the occasion when offered, unless they are driven to it by extreme necessity … [And] let them not allow themselves to be swayed by any private affection, but be led by concern for the people alone. Otherwise, they very wickedly abuse their power, which has been given them not for their own advantage, but for the benefit and service of others.[2]

Calvin is clearly disturbed here by the arrogance with which leaders often deal with the questions of military violence. Anyone considering the use of force, he is saying, must engage in a careful process of self-examination. To put it in simple terms, we must look honestly at our own sinful capacity for self-deception and we must reflect deeply on the humanness of the people to ward whom our violent remedies would be directed. Calvin is very aware here of the fact that because of our depraved natures we are inclined to do exactly the opposite of what he is proposing: we tend to exalt our own motives and to devalue the humanity of our opponents. So, as a spiritual corrective, we sinners need to be diligent in paying special attention to our own faults, while constantly reminding ourselves of the humanity of those with whom we disagree. In Calvin's scheme, the Just War doctrine must also serve as, we might say, an instrument of spiritual formation.

Of special significance for this way of looking at issues of violence is the important Christian teaching that all human beings are created in God's image. This is the basis for Calvin's insistence that rulers must "have pity on the common nature in the one whose special fault they are punishing." Saint Augustine, whose authority he appeals to at this point, is equally insistent in emphasizing this important element of theological anthropology. In Augustine's letter to Marcellinus, to which Calvin is referring, Augustine warns that in punishing evildoers rulers run the risk of defeating their external enemies only to be destroyed by "the enemy within" as they pursue their violent campaigns with "depraved and distorted hearts." To avoid these consequences, Augustine urges, we must cultivate "those kindly feelings which keep us from returning evil for evil." If we can manage to do so, "even war will not be waged without kindness, and it will be easier for a society whose peace is based on piety and justice to take thought for the conquered."[3]

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