The concept of the "intrinsically evil"

In both of my careers as a Catholic thinker—my former one as a professor, and my current one as a blogger—I have found it a real challenge to get across to people what is meant by saying that some acts are "intrinsically evil." The phrase from traditional moral theology so translated is intrinsece malum, which is often used in magisterial documents. As we contemplate the Holy Family this Christmas season, it occurs to me that misunderstanding about the concept of the intrinsically evil (IE) is especially rampant in the area of sexual morality. Today I want to contribute to a correct understanding by excluding two equal and opposite misapplications of the concept to the specific question of contraception.

But first, the concept itself. In his landmark encyclical Veritatis Splendor, Pope John Paul the Great explicated IE thus:

Reason attests that there are objects of the human act which are by their nature "incapable of being ordered" to God, because they radically contradict the good of the person made in his image. These are the acts which, in the Church's moral tradition, have been termed "intrinsically evil" (intrinsece malum): they are such always and per se, in other words, on account of their very object, and quite apart from the ulterior intentions of the one acting and the circumstances.

Now, VS was the first document of its level of authority to actually give a magisterial explication, as distinct from application, of the concept of IE. A short time before that, CCC §1761 had made a start: "...there are certain specific kinds of behaviour that are always wrong to choose, because choosing them involves a disorder of the will, that is, a moral evil." That was important because it made clearer to people that intrinsically evil acts are those of kinds that it's "always wrong to choose," irrespective of any further feature of the particular act or of any further consideration about the act. In that respect, VS was an advance. Yet perforce, its explication of intrinsice malum comes after a quite interesting explication of various associated concepts that must be understood if that of IE itself is to be understood. I highly recommend them to the reader. But further interpretation and clarification is obviously needed and ongoing.

One important clarification must begin with stressing that distinctively "moral evil" is a "disorder" precisely of "the will." Hence, to will something that is intrinsically evil is a moral evil because so willing disorders precisely the will of the agent itself. But given as much, one cannot specify what, if anything, is intrinsically evil about a physical act merely by describing its physical features. And that's because one cannot say what makes the act distinctively human, an actus humanus, merely by describing what happens when somebody initiates a chain of physical events. Rather, the "object of the human act" that makes the act intrinsically evil has to be something done intentionally by the agent, in such a way that the physical feature of the act that makes the act morally significant is precisely that which "embodies the agent's intention"—a phrase first coined by Catholic philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe in her now-classic book Intention. That is the sense in which JP2 speaks of "objects of the human act" as subject to moral evaluation. Such an object is not so much what occurs in virtue of a freely chosen act; if it were, then there could be no morally significant distinction between the foreseen and the intended consequences of acts. That in turn would rule out any principle of double effect (PDE); but PDE is regularly invoked and applied in orthodox moral theology, as it should be, even though it's not yet fully clear how to formulate PDE in such a way as to minimize its misapplication. No, the "object of the human act" is what embodies the intention of the agent, even if some of what the agent foresees as flowing from what he does is not what he intends. If and when such an object is intrinsically evil, that is because what is willed and intended is an act of a kind that disorders the will of the agent. Why is that so important?

Consider the Church's teaching that contraception is "intrinsically evil." What does that mean? Citing Humanae Vitae §14, CCC §2370 says: "every action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible" is intrinsically evil. The Vademecum for Confessors even says that "[t]his teaching is to be held as definitive and irreformable," which leaves confessors with no excuse for excusing contraception. Now the phrase 'whether as an end or as a means' tips us off that what's subject to moral evaluation here is what one "proposes" and thus intends to do regarding something very specific. If one has sexual intercourse that one has intentionally acted so to make sterile, then whether or not the act of intercourse (a) is or would have been sterile in fact and regardless, or (b) is wrong for some other reason, the act embodying the intention to make it sterile it is itself intrinsically evil. In that sense, contraception is the "object" of that sort of "human act," and it is that object the willing of which is a disorder of the will, regardless of what otherwise ends up happening. On the other hand, periodic continence for the purpose of avoiding conception, although can sometimes be wrong for a number of reasons, is not said to be intrinsically wrong, because it is not the sort of act which, just in itself, embodies an intention to do something which it is a disorder of the will to do intentionally. Hence, under certain conditions discussed in magisterial documents, "natural family planning" (NFP) for purposes of avoiding conception can be morally acceptable. Since one is not doing anything to make procreation impossible when it might otherwise be possible, there is no "object of the human act" that is intrinsically evil as contraception is said to be.

Nonetheless, there are two equal and opposite errors about this teaching among Catholics. The more common one, which is common for all-too-obvious reasons, is an objection to the teaching itself: it is held that given the ultimate intention involved, there is no morally significant difference between contraception and NFP. That objection is registered by progs and trads for very different reasons; if it were sound, then the Church's developed teaching would be incoherent and thus not a fit object for assent.

But the objection simply misses what is meant by saying that contraception, or indeed any other sort of act, is "intrinsically evil." To call a given sort of act intrinsically evil is not to say that the further intention with which one does it, beyond the intention it actually embodies, is unacceptable. There can be all sorts of laudable further intentions with which one does something intrinsically evil. One can, for instance, intentionally kill innocent human beings with the purpose of preventing even more deaths; that, indeed, was the precise rationale for the atom-bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But that didn't make the tactic morally acceptable according to Church teaching; quite the contrary. In Evangelium Vitae §57, the same pope who wrote VS condemned any and all "direct, voluntary killing of an innocent human being" as "gravely immoral" regardless of any further intention one might have for doing such a thing. Similarly, what's intrinsically evil about contraception is not the further intention to avoid conception—which can, according to the 20th-century popes, be morally responsible—but rather the intention actually embodied in the act of contraception itself, i.e., to "render procreation impossible." Now, just why that is supposed to be intrinsically evil, apart from any further intention-with-which it is done, is unclear to a great many Catholics; and that lacuna in understanding is what accounts for the inability of some to see the moral difference between contraception and NFP. I've addressed that issue before, citing mostly JP2's "theology of the body," and shall not dilate on it here; the immediate point is that the issue is separate from that of just what sort of intentional act is said to be intrinsically evil in the first place. Only when one is clear on just what is being so condemned can one then go on to learn why it is condemned, and also why a different pattern of action with the same further intention as contraception is not intrinsically evil, even though it can sometimes be evil all the same.

The opposite error is not an objection to the teaching itself, but rather an over-rigorous interpretation of one of its premises. On this showing, the relevant "object" of the human act can be characterized as intrinsically evil not only apart from the agent's further intention in doing what he does, but apart from his immediate intention as well. For instance, if a married couple one of whose members is HIV-positive use a condom purely for prophylactic purposes, their sexual act is of a sort that is known to anti-procreative in effect even if not by intent. That's because what condoms do, when they are non-defective and used as directed, is prevent semen from being deposited in the vagina. From that, it is thought to follow that the object of the couple's sexual act, for purposes of moral evaluation, is morally unacceptable for the same sort of reason that, say, anal intercourse is unacceptable. The pattern of action is thought to be such that the sexual act in question cannot be said to have procreative significance, because it cannot bear the intrinsic relationship to procreation that HV says the conjugal act must bear. Accordingly, condomistic sex even for purely prophylactic purposes cannot qualify as a conjugal act at all, and is intrinsically evil for the same reason that sodomy is: it's an inherently non-procreative sort of act. That is held to be so even supposing that the couple would be happy to conceive if they could block HIV transmission without blocking sperm too, and even supposing that the blocking of sperm is not a means to the blocking of HIV transmission. A good example of such reasoning is this paper from Luke Gormally, a man I know personally, and one with whom I've debated this very question before on this blog.

The difficulty with that view is rather similar to one that prog theologians have often raised against what they considered the standard neo-scholastic explanation for the wrongfulness of both contraception and sodomy. That standard explanation, according to some prog apologists and theologians, was that contraception and sodomy are immoral because "unnatural," meaning that they run counter to the "natural" purpose of sexual activity: procreation. Sex that is unnatural in that sort of way was held, or thought to have been held, to be an evil object of action, irrespective of any subjective disposition of the agent, and hence irrespective of intention. Unnatural acts were thus accounted intrinsically evil. Now if that really had been the explanation, I would agree with the prog critique. What's wrong with the explanation, such as it is, is that it doesn't tell us why it is unacceptable to interrupt or depart from the course of nature in this sort of case but perfectly acceptable to do so in many others, such medicine, animal husbandry, or even cosmetology. In order to tell us that, it would have to specify how interrupting or departing from the course of nature in the case of sex embodies an intention that makes the act an intrinsically evil sort of act, i.e. an act of a sort that disorders the will when intended.

Of course I'm not at all convinced that the ancient and medieval understanding about the wrongfulness of contraception and sodomy was as ill-informed as the prog critique often makes out. It was understood better among them than among us that lust, with all its attendant disorders, increases in direct proportion to the deliberate unmooring of sex from procreation. And that should tell us something. For my immediate purpose, it tells us something that both Paul VI and John Paul II were keen to stress. What makes contraception and sodomy wrong is that they sunder a connection which is essential to our inner spiritual health, to the proper "order" of the will, thus causing us to a greater or lesser extent to treat our sexual partners as objects with which to satisfy ourselves. I've had enough experience with both licit and illicit sex to verify that for myself. But if the VS account of the objects of the "human act," is correct, then there is an intrinsically evil act here only if and when one actually intends the sundering, such that the sexual act in question embodies one's intention to break the intrinsic relationship between sex and procreation. I am not in the least convinced that condom use by married couples for the purpose of preventing infection by a lethal virus, and only for that purpose, embodies such an intention. Such activity might be wrong for other reasons, and I believe it is wrong for at least one other reason. But it is not wrong just because it is foreseeably non-procreative in effect, just as a given war is not wrong because, like all wars, it foreseeably results in the death of innocents.

To say that an action of a certain sort, such as contraception, is "intrinsically evil" is to say that it embodies an intention which it is a disorder of the will to have. Just how to identify embodied intentions and disorders of the will is the subject-matter of moral psychology. We have more than enough psychologists and moralists, but we don't have enough moral psychologists. That's because we don't have enough saints, enough lovers of God and neighbor, in the here and now. John Paul the Great was one of them. Let us learn from him.

“In that hope, I hold that He will not allow those who love Him to roast forever in Hell for the crime of doing their duty to defend their homelands against the aggressor, even if in so doing they killed innocent people.”

Suppose that there are Just Wars and Unjust Wars. Is The Church to tell us which is which? Has that ever worked anywhere? Will God, without repentence, forgive those who do their duty in an unjust war?

No recognizing sin for sin and dealing with it through the sacraments is leading to a sort of moral relativism in the West which may well lead to its downfall because, unlike the recognition of the sinfulness of war in the Christian East, its non recognition or nuanced recognition in the West makes the whole concept of evil disappear, sort of like the Evil One has, BC.

My purpose here is not to pick at a “wound”, though pretending that Orthodoxy and Roman believe the exact same things is pernicious and destructive. My purpose is to point out the danger the West faces because of the results of its inability, ultimately because of pieces of Latin theology, to deal with Evil and evil.

I realize that by jumping in here I am at risk of making a fool of myself, since the reasoning in the article was probably out of my league subtlety-wise. But here goes.

Let me use an example here: the controversies between e.g. Mark Shea vs Jimmy Akin on the question of whether torture is intrinsically wrong.

Mark Shea is passionate and exasperated: "C'mon, OF COURSE torture is intrinsically wrong. It's the hallmark of hell! Just say 'This Is Damnable' and stop splitting hairs!" While Jimmy Akin is saying, "Do we have an adequate definition of torture? Does it have to involve pain or injury? Or would it include any coercion of the will? Is it the same as enhanced interrogation? Is any and all interrogation of a prisoner coercive in itself?" etc. etc.

My feelings are with Mark Shea, but my mind wants to go the limit with Jimmy Akin. It seems to me that the more serious a moral question is, the more crucially important it is to get the definition exactly right.

Err on one side, and you're OK'ing electric shock to the suspect's genitals on the mere possibility that the procedure could yield actionable intelligence; err on the other side, and all jail and prisons must be abolished because confinement is torture.

On the question of family limitation: err on the one side, and you're OKing marital sodomy because it's "naturally" infertile; err on the other side, and you're abolishing marital NFP because it's "unnatural" to abstain. (I've actually heard both positions argued on FR!)

Bottom line: I find casuistry --"Jesuitical thinking" --- laborious and exasperating. Nevertheless, I think the process of thinking our way through definitions, intentions, laws and cases absolutely necessary.

Kolokotronis, I am aware --- I really am ---that Satan is prowling about, looking for souls to devour. But one of his techniques is convincing people that they needn't reason closely and persistently. He's he one who tempts people not to think things through.

“Bottom line: I find casuistry —”Jesuitical thinking” -— laborious and exasperating. Nevertheless, I think the process of thinking our way through definitions, intentions, laws and cases absolutely necessary.”

In the laws which govern a civil Anglo Saxon society, I agree 100%. The Common Law is in many ways “Jesuitical” and in human society it is a better system than Code Law and all the other systems. Indeed I think it is a gift directly from God. In theology, which has informed so much of our civil system, it is disastrous. Understand, MRS D-o, that I think the West is a religious ship wreck and that the ultimate cause of the ship wreck are some relatively fine points of Latin theology, especially that influenced by +Augustine. Anyway, this one time you and I, dear lady, will have to disagree.

“I was tempted to send a bee-in-the-bonnet letter about the deficiencies I see in Orthodoxy and the “shipwreck” of the Eastern Church. But I won’t, because it would take too long, and probably provoke an even longer one from you, O learned and wise one!”

You should have done it. This issue of responses to evil and concepts like Just War among a host of others have to be discussed frankly if there is ever to be a successful and long lasting re-established communion between Orthodoxy and the Latin Church. Why would you or any Latin be adverse to discussing these issues if they are of such concern to your Eastern interlocutors that we think the West is headed for destruction on account of them? And I can assure you that if you think that the teachings or praxis of Orthodoxy are leading Eastern Christianity to perdition, we need to hear that too. I am not suggesting that we need to beat dead horses here, for example, re-hashing papal infallibility. Our hierarchs are dealing with that. But on issues such as these, which are very, very important, we can discuss and disagree, hopefully with some back-up.

This was an excellent post. To think or not to think? And which side does Satan take? I'm not at all convinced that Satan would prefer us to keep it simple. In fact, just the opposite may well be true.

All this sophistry is just that. It is justification and relativism and the idolatry of reason and the pride of intellect, all masquerading as false maturity. Christ admonished us to be as little children. I wonder if all this mental gymnastics merely serves to gloss over what is really, truly evil. Justifying Hiroshima and torture and war in general has Satan's fingerprints all over it.

"Quite clearly servants fight in a fallen world, like this one but there is no need for that in the kingdom of God."

Revelation 12:7-9
"And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray."

War is a clash of wills. It happens in Heaven just as it does here. There is no sin in war itself. The sin lies in what is being imposed. If one fights to establish freedom, which is the imposition of nothing, the abolishment of imposition, and the establishment of individual rights protection, then there is no sin.

"“Is then His kingdom not of this world also? Certainly it is."

God said in that passage, that His Kingdom is not of this World. So this conclusion and claim is false.

"“If I had been of this world, ‘My servants would fight, that I should not be delivered.’” Here He showeth the weakness of kingship among us, that its strength lies in servants; but that which is above is sufficient for itself, needing nothing."

It is not simple weakness. He is not the King of this world and does not impose His will. Note that Peter and those with him could have prevented His capture, but God told them not to fight. God did not say it was a sin, but said to do so would be contrary to His will, which fundamentally was to honor the freedom given as a gift from the beginning. He came to teach, not to impose His will.

He instructed men to honor freedom, just as He does. Matthew 10:14
If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town.

Though he did not say that one should not fight to defend one's self, or others. Luke 22:35-38
Then Jesus asked them, "When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?"
"Nothing," they answered.

He said to them, "But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. It is written: 'And he was numbered with the transgressors'[Isaiah 53:12]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment."

The disciples said, "See, Lord, here are two swords."
"That is enough," he replied.

The instruction to honor freedom in Matt 10:14 and to teach His moral code, can not be done if one submits to any will that is in opposition to freedom, or that violates rights. If anyone seeks theosis, they must recognize that evil is to be opposed and that evil is defined by rights violations, which are manefest by examining the moral code. Evil is not inherent in simple, or violent opposition of will. Else God Himself would be evil for opposing the will of satan, and bringing a sword, instead of peace. Matthew 10:34-
"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to turn
" 'a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law -
a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.'[Micah 7:6]

Just as war is not inherently evil, neither is peace inherently good. Those that do not enjoy the gift of freedom, which must be extended as a gift from everyone, know that quite well.

I'm disturbed that Orthodoxy does not teach the integrity of the marital act (against contraception) and the indissolubility of sacramental marriage (against divorce/remarriage.)

Not that in Catholic parochial and pastoral practice the teaching has always been effective (pause to shake head, roll eyes, and mutter Kyrie eleison) but in Catholicism at least the doctrine is there. Seems that at the point where the devil is attacking the very roots of human life, the Orthodox Church is mute.

A controversy about something so important as these issues of sacramental marital morality could be resolved in Orthodoxy I think, in theory, by an Ecumenical Council; but as I undersrtand it, nobody in Orthodoxy --- no individual, body, organ or group --- has the power to convene an Ecumenical Council. Hence the lack of moral voice.

Consider the following figures and contemplate the sui-genocide (or geno-suicide) of Christianity East and West:

Total fertility rates, 2007 est.:

Serbia 1.69

Portugal 1.48

Russia 1.39

Greece 1.35

Italy 1.34

Spain 1.29

These figures are not only unprecedented in the history of the human race, but, considering the median ages of the populations-- Greece, female, 42; Spain, female, 44 -- may turn out to be irreversible. Allah fubar.

On matters of high theology dealing with the Trinity, filioque, the effects of our first ancestors' sin, the essence and energies of God, etc. I cannot dispute, because beyond the middle-school level of discussion I don't understand any of these topics. (I've tried. I don't even understand Frank Sheed.)

Ball's in your court.

“I’m disturbed that Orthodoxy does not teach the integrity of the marital act (against contraception) and the indissolubility of sacramental marriage (against divorce/remarriage.)”

These are all subjects which we have discussed before but they are certainly of major importance to Latins and Rome’s position on them is an example of what we call “akrivia”, which means a strict application of the rules. Actually its probably even more than that when it comes to contraception. There it is clearly a dogmatic matter. Eastern Christian theology would say that the fact that the dogma against contraception is honored far more in the breach than in the keeping is conclusive that it is no dogma at all because it has not been accepted by the People of God and lived out. The numbers you posted bear this out. Divorce and remarriage are different matters, really of discipline in both the East and the West. The West pretends to akrivia but then lets people like Kennedy and Kerry and various crowned heads remarry after “annulments” which indulge in the fiction, or at least the usual fiction, that no real marriage existed in the first place. In the East the innocent party gets an “ecclesiastical divorce”. Both churches have accepted the reality of civil divorce. By pretending that no real sacramental marriage ever existed in the first place, Latins can avoid recognizing whatever sin may have been present in the first marriage and subsequent marriages can be as joyous as a first one. Orthodox Christians don’t get joyous weddings after the first. The second is penitential, the third positively funereal. Only three are allowed. No one married more than once in Orthodoxy thinks that what they have gotten is anything more than permission to commit one sin to avoid a greater one (our own Jesuitical reasoning).

“A controversy about something so important as these issues of sacramental marital morality could be resolved in Orthodoxy I think, in theory, by an Ecumenical Council; but as I undersrtand it, nobody in Orthodoxy -— no individual, body, organ or group -— has the power to convene an Ecumenical Council. Hence the lack of moral voice.”

Neither of these issues, as we see them anyway, are issues for an Ecumenical Council because neither of them are matters of dogma, the one being a simple matter of discipline and the other already rejected, though perhaps it could be the subject of a council, the heresy being addressed is the whole culture of death thing current in the First World. But not remarriage; no more than the discipline of priestly celibacy needs an Ecumenical Council. As things stand now, any Patriarch call call for a pan Orthodox Council, but that wouldn’t be Ecumenical. Local Councils can be called by any Metropolitan or Archbishop. In fact, an Ecumenical Council could be called for by any Patriarch, but right now it wouldn’t work because the whole Church cannot sit together because our bishops are not all in communion with each other. Rome can call for a council too, but with no more success. That is what the ongoing dialog the hierarchs are having is dealing with.

It looks like they do. There's a great number in the West that think the same way.

"I suppose that disagreement arises from differing understandings of the concept of freedom, or perhaps better said, what the purpose of freedom is as it is manifest in man."

There's various claims about what freedom is. Some say the condition of freedom exists when one has nothing, no property at all. Others say, it's the ability to pick one's ruler. Logic applies though and there can only be one unique definition of freedom that applies universally. Freedom is the condition where one has and retains sovereignty over their own individual will. Note that all other definitions are corruptions of this definition. Each corruption has as it's purpose to deny individual sovereignty of will and replace it with some other sovereign, whether it be a person, or set of ideals created by someone.

"the purpose of freedom is as it is manifest in man."

Freedom is a universal concept. It not only applies to man, it applies to God also, and any other sentient, rational being. The purpose of freedom is to retain the essence of each individual. Sentient, rational beings are individuals, not extensions of other beings that have any rightful claim to exercise authority over them.

The condition of freedom is a gift each extends to others, as God extended it from the beginning. The only justifiable limits to freedom are those contained in the absolute moral code, that not only protects life, but the soveignty of will that is an essential part of each individual life. Imposition of one's will on another, except to correct, or prevent immediate rights violations, is theft of the fundamental essence of life, which rightfully belongs only to that individual. All of the moral code encompasses that, and the rights violations it prohibits are what is inherently evil.

The gift of life and soveignty of will was and is never to be revoked by God. One's decisions in this world regarding their treatment of others, especially with regard to freedom, will determine where they reside once they leave this world. There is Heaven, where freedom exists, and there is hell, where tyranny exists. The fires of hell are not of God's making, but of those that choose to exert their own will over others, which is to violate their rights.

“The fires of hell are not of God’s making,...”

Well, yes and no. The fire of God’s love burnishes those who have fulfilled their created purpose and have indeed become like Christ, having died to the self while that same fire is torment to those who have freely chosen their own will over that of God.

“...but of those that choose to exert their own will over others, which is to violate their rights.”

Certainly elevating one’s own will over that of others MIGHT be sinful, might be to prefer one’s own will over God’s. But then again, maybe not. The sin is the selfish focusing of the will on personal desires and fulfillment instead of on God to the extent that the “death” of the individual will occurs.

Here’s a way to look at free will or freedom in the baptized Christian:

“Baptism does not take away our free will or freedom of choice, but gives us the freedom no longer to be tyrannized by the devil unless we choose to be. After baptism it is in our power either to persist willingly in the practice of the commandments of Christ, into Whom we were baptized, and to advance in the path of His ordinances, or to deviate from this straight way and to fall again into the hands of our enemy, the devil.” +Symeon the New Theologian

"Justifying Hiroshima and torture and war in general has Satan's fingerprints all over it."

2314 "Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation."

2297 Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity. Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended amputations, mutilations, and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral law."

2309 The strict conditions for legitimate defense by military force require rigorous consideration. The gravity of such a decision makes it subject to rigorous conditions of moral legitimacy. At one and the same time:

the damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;
all other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
there must be serious prospects of success;
the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.

These are the traditional elements enumerated in what is called the "just war" doctrine. The evaluation of these conditions for moral legitimacy belongs to the prudential judgment of those who have responsibility for the common good.

2308 All citizens and all governments are obliged to work for the avoidance of war. However, "as long as the danger of war persists and there is no international authority with the necessary competence and power, governments cannot be denied the right of lawful self-defense, once all peace efforts have failed."

All these are more clearly defined in context. I find the Catechism of the Catholic Church a wonderful resource for carefully thought-out Christian moral principles.

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