We are in agreement as far as that goes. But that conflicts with your earlier statement that "we the people" conflicts with the teachings of the Church because it assumes rights flow from man to man. I disagree. Nowhere in the Preamble can one derive that conclusion if God created free people. Here is the text:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
These were deeply religious men, and I doubt that Madison intended for this to assume that the rights which came from God were somehow negated by this extraoardinary statement placing "the people" over any other natural rule.
If it violates the Natural Law, then it is not a right, and again it does not matter if a king promulgates it or a democracy.
First it requires that you define which natural laws we are talking about. The history of a belief in natural laws predates Christianity and has had many interpretations including those of Aquinas. So until a specific violation of a natural law on which we can agree is cited, then on principle, I will agree. To take it further, a simple statement of a right does not so make one. Declared rights can violate a lot more than natural law.
Till very recently, a surrender by handing over one's sword was sufficient to protect the life of the prisoner.
That frequently worked for the generals, but far less often for the privates. Nonetheless it did exist. Let me give you a few examples that show in general, Christian war has not been a particularly civilized series of events:
A letter dated Sept 12, 1794 described some executions in London: "Two unfortunate victims were condemned to suffer death, in the next month, as follows: 'To be hanged by their necks, but not till they are dead; then to be taken down, and their entrails cut out, their hearts to be burnt in their sight, and their bowels thrown in their faces; their bodies to be quartered, and to be at the disposal of his Majesty." They were Scots. Glad we don't have such horrors today.
Another difference is that prior to the development of the nation-state wars were affairs between private individuals, not between nations.
True, partially because of the huge parcels of land owned. But even in the age of nation states, the intermarrying between nations was supposed to ensure alliances and help prevent war. It didn't. As for the poor troops who had to fight whether it was the 100 Years War, the 30 Years War or all of the other European wars of the 16th through the 20th century, it likely didn't matter much to them to whom their loyalties were pledged.
BTW, off the subject, I saw some rather raw language from you a few days ago...Tsk, tsk...
Yes, I think I have let the subtext dominate the context. The understanding of the American founding fathers was that rights flow from God, and that is reflected in the Preamble, and in most other documents of the period. But the subtext is Europe and in particular your defense of democracy as being something that supercedes religion. While I have little objection against the spirit in which the American Constitution was written, I think that today's political thinking, especially in Europe, has moved away from constitutionalism of Lockean England and republican America, toward the unfortunate attitude that "if we vote for it, it's gotta be the law". That is no freedom.
Indeed it is not always self-evident what the natural law is, while it is always (well, leaving voting irregularities aside) evident what the people voted for. There is no substitute for discernment the will of God, no matter how tempting it is to simply put stuff to a vote.
Regarding indisputable barbarity that occurred in the past as well as in the present. The argument is that Christianity provided a brake on it. Surely, it worked better among the aristocracy, but then that was the system, that the aristocracy was setting the standard of behavior for the common man.
Some of your examples are off-target. Napoleon had a very strained relationship with the Church, which never really recognized him as a valid monarch (The Pope that was present at his coronation was his prisoner). The use of gas against combatants is not inherently injust method of war; nor do I set up the First World War as any kind of standard by merely pointing out that remnants of civilized behavior were still apparent then.
Regarding the Cathars and other heretics, -- they were considered enemy of the state and were suppressed as such. Insurgencies of no religious significance were put down with equal brutality. The Church could not declare their heresies valid because they were not valid; yet nothing short of that would have spared those who chose not to recant. We've discussed that before. Parenthetically, if gnosticism, with its belief in hidden knowledge accessible to a caste of priests only, and evilhood of all human effort except extreme self-negation, were to gain the upper hand anywhere, men of secularist-humanitarian outlook would have much more than an occasional auto-da-fe to complain about.
Every heretic, burnt at a stake
Proves his theory, or learns his mistake
Consequences are major
Of a heretic's wager
New Jerusalem, or fiery lake