“Blank Check” – Thinking Pacifism

Ted Grimsrud—September 13, 2023

At this stage in my life, retired but still trying to be productive with my research and writing, I find myself wanting to narrow my interests. I hope to find a level of focus that will enable me to reduce distractions and zero in on doing what I have left to do. The big theme that has my attention is trying better to understand why our world and, especially, the nation I live in are in such dire straits. I know that no matter how focused I might be enabled to be, this theme will be beyond me. But I hope that by putting my best energy into such a project I might be able to make at least a little progress.

So, I was happy to be invited to make a presentation on September 11, 2023, to the monthly meeting of the Anabaptist Center for Religion and Society at Eastern Mennonite University. I decided to share what I call a “theological memoir” that, I think, sets a personal context for my “Why is America in such dire straits?” project. By “theological memoir,” I mean reflections on what I believe are some of my important theological convictions in the context of the elements of my life that brought them forth.

I have divided the reflections I shared into three posts. This one is the first, and I will call it “Embedded theology.” It has to do with the context in which I grew up, both my family and my homeland in rural America, and what I inherited theologically. By “theology” I have in mind a sense of what matters the most, what rests at the top of our hierarchy of values. Certainly, our sense of “God” is theological, but even if we don’t self-consciously affirm God’s existence, we still have some kind of theology. All of us have a hierarchy of values, convictions about what matters the most, about what core beliefs shape our lives.

The second, “Jesus’s gospel of peace,” has to do with the transformation that happened in my theology in the mid-1970s. This was when some of the key elements of my embedded theology became crystalized, and I embraced them as a consequence of my encounter with Jesus and peace theology. I at that point came to an understanding of “peace” that I still have: Peace as having to do with the wholeness, with the health, with the wellbeing of the global community. This wholeness means the health and wellbeing of all creatures within the global community and of each sub-community. Such a sense of wholeness requires being attentive especially to the vulnerable and marginalized members of the community. It also requires a recognition that a peaceful outcome requires peaceful means at all stages—that is, violence, especially warfare, is not compatible with health and wholeness. The inspiration for my understanding of peace comes from the Bible, especially the biblical concept of “shalom.”

Then, third, I will touch on my political journey as a pastor and theology professor. I call that post, “The American Empire without blinders.” By the term “empire,” I have in mind a general sense of the United States as a superpower whose influence and engagement encompass a great deal of the world. I am not using “empire” in a particularly technical sense, but more in an everyday, general sensibility kind of way. By “American Empire,” I mainly mean, “America’s role as a dominant power far outside of its own boundaries.”

Continue reading “A Christian pacifist in the American Empire, Part 1: Embedded theology” →

Ted Grimsrud—April 13, 2023

One of the aspects of Christianity that has long troubled me and has played an increasingly significant role in my sense of my own faith has been how Christianity has for so long and so decisively been comfortable with “warism” (by which I mean to believe in war, to have a generally uncritical and positive disposition toward preparing for, threatening, promoting, and ultimately fighting in war). I grew up in my family with a mild warism and a vague Christian sensibility and had no sense that there could be a tension between the two. After my conversion at age 17, my religious convictions became much stronger as did my warism (in church, I was presented a very favorable view of America’s wars).

However, a few years later, I embraced Christian pacifism and became convicted that warism and Christian faith should be mutually exclusive. The contradiction became apparent once I began to see Jesus’s message as politically normative for Christians. Very quickly, I also came to see warism as deeply problematic on its own terms even when not judged in light of Jesus’s message. Mainly, though, my convictions about Jesus showed me the inherent problems with warism. As John Prine sang back in those days, “Jesus don’t like killing, no matter what the reason for.” I faced a crucial historical question. What changed? If Jesus was about peace, how did his followers become so warist?

Christianity’s turn from Jesus’s way

From the time of my embrace of Christian pacifism, I have wanted to understand better why the large majority of Christians have tended not to do likewise. I learned that the history of Christianity from New Testament times to the fourth century is ambiguous on questions of war and peace. Hence, analyses tend to be contested. I feel comfortable saying, though, that earliest Christianity did (with few exceptions) apply Jesus’s teachings in a way that led to pacifism. We have no record of a Christian leader supporting participation in warfare until the 4^th century.

The evolution of Christianity during its first few centuries did move in the direction of the acceptance of war even though not in overt and direct ways. The big picture political situation changed early in the 4^th century when Emperor Constantine formally established a rapprochement with Christianity following generations of intense and at times deadly persecution. Christians, it seems, accepted that connection immediately and without debate and in short order became soldiers and supporters of the Empire’s wars—to the point that less than a century after the initial rapprochement, only Christians were allowed in the Roman military.

Shockingly (at least from the point of view of Christian pacifism), the history of Christianity since the 4^th century is, essentially, a history of the largely uncritical acceptance of war in almost all Christian communities. This is shocking because this warism seems so drastically contrary to what Jesus advocated. It is also shocking because we have virtually no record of debate or disagreement with the turn toward war among Christian leaders. And it is shocking as well that Jesus’s life and teaching essentially disappeared from the main accounts of Christian theology and ethics (this is apparent early on in the authoritative creeds and confessions of the churches that, typically, if they mention Jesus’s life at all, jump from his virgin birth to his crucifixion).

Continue reading “Why do so many Christians support warism? [Questioning Faith #20]” →