Letter to US Bishops on Selective Conscientious Objection

Dear Catholic Bishops of the United States,

At your November meeting in 2008, you voted unanimously to call all parishes to participate in the national postcard campaign to stop the "Freedom of Choice Act" (FOCA). This campaign involved both education and grassroots action (sending millions of postcards to our Members of Congress). Parishes across the country participated in this campaign on the weekend of January 24th and 25th in 2009. This postcard campaign was an excellent example of the Catholic Church bearing witness in the public realm to the sacredness of all human life.

On the third year anniversary of this campaign, we are wondering if you would consider undertaking a similar campaign for selective conscientious objection, an issue which also directly touches upon the issue of the sacredness of human life, in this case via war, in which large numbers of people inevitably lose their lives. As you have spelled out in your peace pastorals, the Challenge of Peace and the Harvest of Justice is Sown in Peace, all Catholics are called to be peacemakers and develop the corresponding virtues for nonviolent peacemaking. Conscientious objectors to all war are honored for their courageous witness. However, official teaching does allow for limited war, i.e. just war theory when certain strict criteria are met. The limited or just war theory requires Catholics to evaluate each war on a case by a case basis in order to determine whether it is just and so whether they can participate in it.

While the laws in the United States allow for conscientious objection, the laws do not allow for selective conscientious objection for Catholics who accept in principle the limited/just war theory. On March 8, 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on the case of Gillette v. United States: "The exemption for those who oppose participation in war in any form applies to those who oppose participating in all war and not to those who object to participation in a particular war only.

For decades, the USCCB has articulated its support for selective conscientious objection, yet few Catholics are aware of the issue or the USCCBs position. There are some 1.5 million Catholics in the armed forces of the United States today, all of which are placed in a somewhat compromised position. They are bound in conscience to evaluate the justice of any act they undertake in the military (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2313), and yet their military will not respect their right to follow their conscience and refuse to fight if they determine that a particular war fails to meet the hard tests of the limited/just war theory.

Over the last three decades, the Vatican and your conference have raised serious questions whether it is possible for modern war in all its savagery to meet the strict criteria of the just war theory, given the power of conventional weapons, the escalating number of civilian causalities in recent wars, and the broader spread of a culture of death, with its glorification of violence and its loss of a sense of the sacredness of life. As you note in the Harvest of Justice is Sown in Peace, it is to be wondered if a culture such as ours is capable of applying the criteria appropriately. "The increasing violence of our society, its growing insensitivity to the sacredness of life and the glorification of the technology of destruction in popular culture could inevitably impair our society's ability to apply just-war criteria honestly and effectively in time of crisis." The letter continues, "In the absence of a commitment of respect for life and a culture of restraint, it will not be easy to apply the just-war tradition, not just as a set of ideas, but as a system of effective social constraints on the use of force." In this context, it would seem all the more pressing to have the provision for selective conscientious objection in place for Catholics in the military. We respectfully ask then that you consider a widespread campaign of education and advocacy, similar to the national postcard campaign, in order to initiate such a change. With Gods Spirit, we have the opportunity and the power to increasingly transform our society toward practices that illuminate the sacredness of all life.