Before we had an all-volunteer Army, the United States government historically made provisions for conscientious objectors in the military draft procedure known as the Selective Service System. A conscientious objector was either classified as 1-A-O and served in the military as a non-combatant, or was classified as 1-O and served in an alternative service capacity, such as an orderly in a VA hospital.
But the government only recognized people who objected to military service based on religious grounds, not moral or philosophical grounds. This tended to favor Christians from the historic peace churches such as the Mennonites and Quakers who include pacifism as part of their religious training. Accordingly, the Christian had to be opposed to all wars to be a conscientious objector.
During the Vietnam War, the Supreme Court widened the definition of religious grounds to include any Christian with sincere beliefs regarding military service. But the court did not extend the privilege to those who opposed specific wars on the basis of moral or philosophical grounds. It was thus impossible for a Christian who opposed a specific war on the grounds that it was unjust or immoral to be classified as a conscientious objector.
a just war
Most churches embraced what is known as the Just War Theory. But they usually failed to apply it to any conflict. Governments were regularly given the benefit of the doubt that their cause and their actions are just. The just-war criteria were generally ignored and, as a result, Christians frequently march off to kill one another in service to the state without a second thought. As churches, we engaged in no serious dialogue, no discussion, and no concrete debate. In practice the just-war theory was not taken seriously by anyone—church or state.
But there is another viewpoint, and that is one that I think Dietrich Bonhoeffer was faced with in World War II. Participating in military service as an armed combatant requires the Christian to be ready to take human life. Therefore the basic stance of the individual Christian and the church should be that participation in warfare is always fundamentally wrong and that non-participation should be the norm. This I think was Bonhoeffer’s view. Participation in war is sinful and unjust.
But, from Bonhoeffer’s viewpoint, if the individual Christian believes that by participating in this sinful activity a greater good may be gained—the protection of innocent people or the control of aggressive states—then the individual has a right to make that ethical decision—one of conscientious participation in violence. The individual must assess the situation and the alternatives and must determine what is the just, right, and compassionate thing to do.
