THE problem with Fr Kevin Ryan’s view (CL 30/5/04), as I have seen it, is the difficulty in responding to evil that prevails when a response is required according to basic moral standards.
If the issue is evil, that is in the case of violence put on others, be that in the home, your street or your nation and institutions, who will respond to defend the victims? Who will lay down their life so that others may have life in this life?
Many in our Churches will not disrupt their comfort for the sake of others.
Sexual violence seems so obviously evil, yet some in our Churches and homes could not bring themselves to act, even for the children in their care.
At the national level, state violence initiated by national leaders, where hundreds of thousands were put to death or left to die of starvation and disease by neglect, seems to me to be an obvious evil, yet many in leading positions of Church and state condemn those who take armed action to put a stop to such violence.
I refer here to the situation in Iraq. In our nation, America is condemned.
There are many examples of state violence in recent times from Pol Pot to North Korea where no one would step in to put an end to such violence, even the United Nations, and millions are victims.
So I ask what is the greater evil? Those who commit themselves to action on behalf of the victims or those who find a safe corner and standby with full knowledge?
One strange phenomena we see on our TV nowadays is mothers who pray for their daughters and sons to become suicide bombers as they sit in their homes manufacturing suicide bomb vests. They then call them martyrs as they kill busloads of children. This phenomena is becoming worldwide as others see it is effective.
Then, of course, we could read, study and then develop an appropriate response from great religious teachings. Then we would have a Just War theory and the lesser of two evils would become clear, to some.
BRIAN ROSS
Gladstone, Qld
