The theory of a “just war” was one of the subjects Pope Leo XIV had explicitly asked to put on the agenda for the cardinals he gathered at the Vatican a wee ago. This traditional doctrine, mentioned in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, is defined by precise elements. The Catholic Church judges the moral legitimacy of war by a number of criteria, including proportionality, necessity, the guarantee of success, and the legitimacy of the state authority intending to wage it.
However, in his first encyclical, Magnifica humanitas, Pope Leo XIV invited the Church to “go beyond” this concept. This call was echoed by Cardinal Víctor Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. He spoke during the consistory, explaining that “the putting into practice, but also the very notion of legitimate defense must be better clarified in order to be understood in its strictest sense.” For the prefect, legitimate defense has become a pretext today for an “enormous disproportion of military interventions” in various parts of the world.
During the numerous small group discussions that now characterize the consistories organized by Leo XIV, some cardinals also emphasized “the necessity of going beyond the logic of the ‘just war,’ because the Gospel does not impose itself by force.” They suggested speaking “rather of a right to a proportionate defense,” according to the Holy See’s report.
Faced with the “profound transformations that have occurred in the nature of contemporary conflicts,” this reflection deserves to be developed further with “theological and pastoral rigor,” the Pontiff added in his concluding remarks.
An end to just aggressions
For one Roman observer, “it isn’t a matter of questioning the theory of the just war, but of the circumstances of its use.” Today, the canon lawyer notes, “it seems that a shift has taken place from the concept of just war toward the concept of just aggression: one justifies aggression, whereas the traditional theory justified the response to aggressions.”
A Vatican source sees the possibility of a deeper doctrinal reflection in the future. They suggest the Church could declare there is no such thing as a just war, but only “a legitimate defense.” This framework follows the principle of the lesser evil. From this perspective, “there is never a just war but possible wars; there is never a just aggression but a just defense.”
Other experts interviewed by Aleteia emphasize the need to rely on the concept of proportionality to take into account the greater scale of war in the era of digital technology. “One could perhaps think of an expression no longer of ‘just war,’ but of ‘proportional war,’” one expert notes.
Will it be a matter of condemning the just war? Should this concept be removed from the Catechism of the Catholic Church? How can it be better clarified? The work has now begun.
