ChatGPT for American ThinkerPosted on 11/10/2025 6:12:37 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
For centuries, many European Christians have proudly declared that following Jesus means rejecting violence. But as Russia’s brutal war against Ukraine drags into its fourth year, even lifelong pacifists are beginning to ask whether peace can survive without the means to defend it.
Christianity Today reports on a moral and theological shift taking place among Europe’s faithful.
Alexander Maßmann, a Christian ethicist who used to oppose to military buildup, now admits, “We are simply faced with naked aggression. There must be some sort of deterrence. To keep the peace, we need security guarantees — and rearmament is helpful in that sense.”
Such a statement would have been unthinkable among Germany’s Protestant leaders a decade ago, when Margot Käßmann, then head of the Evangelical Church in Germany, pushed nonviolence and diplomacy. Käßmann recently repeated her call for a cease-fire in Ukraine and an end to weapons deliveries, reminding believers that “God is not a party to war.”
But not everyone agrees. What has changed the thinking? Russian missiles destroying apartments.
Pacifism risks becoming an ally to the violent when it leaves one side disarmed. Maßmann’s reluctant conclusion echoes the logic of the just war theory: peace may require defending the innocent, even if it means killing other human beings.
This isn’t just a European debate. American churches are divided over whether supporting Ukraine’s defense or Israel’s right to exist contradicts the Gospel of peace. It should be noted that it’s one thing to follow Jesus’ command not to resist an evil person and be willing to surrender your own life in defense of your faith, but Jesus did not command his followers to surrender the lives of others for the same purpose.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Sanctimony eventually yields to reality. As Orwell said, “pacifists are people who rely on other people to do their fighting for them.”
Islam will be their downfall, not Russia.
Luke 22:36
St Augustine of Hippo called it a “just war”.
And sometimes peace requires war.
And sometimes war IS peace. 🤡
Quit feeding Ukraine arms and support, war is over. The war wouldn’t even have come about if not for the US supporting a coup. Then of course the Ukrainians began requiring Russian speaking citizens of Ukraine, to quit speaking Russian. Then the went after them, and Russia came in. All I really know about that area of the world for sure is, my Grandfather was born in what Ukraine calls Ukraine now, but when the Czar was in power before Communism, that land was Russian. My grandfather was born there, great grandfather, great great grandfather, and so on. I have the Birth Certificates, going back into the early parts of the 1800’s.
Christian against Christian wars have decimated Europe’s male population.
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