Dear Editor, Mary Kenny hits the nail on the head when praising the peaceful, legal and constitutional paths of the Liberator, Daniel O’Connell (IC 21/07/2016).
Her description of the scenes of blood running on the streets and heads on pikes along the roadsides which the young O’Connell saw during the French Revolution in 1789 is very insightful.
No moral leader could be comfortable with asking young men to go to war after seeing these pogroms.
I think it should be customary for Irish Catholics to refer also to John Hume when mentioning Daniel O’Connell as they had very similar moral compasses. Their influence on Irish history has been very similar too.
But I would take Mary Kenny to task on the justification of war – “a time for war” – in the Book of Ecclesiastes which, like me, Mary is not comfortable with.
Of course, everything is justified in the Old Testament, including violence, war and even genocide. It can, therefore, not be regarded as a Christian text, but a description of a pre-Christian era which Christ came to change.
There cannot be a Christian basis for war, either Just or Holy, deriving from the Old Testament of the Bible and, as there is no basis for war in Christ’s teaching, there simply is no Christian justification for going to war. “Love your enemies,” Jesus said.
O’Connell and Hume made that pretty clear.
Yours etc.,
John O’Connell,
Derry.