Is nonviolence a practical or sustainable practice for a country still at war? Is it even biblical? Assuming the command to love one’s enemies is at the heart of the Gospel, a number of crucial and difficult questions arise. In this book, editors Tripp York and Justin Bronson Barringer have assembled provocative essays from a number of well-known pastors, scholars, and activists, including Sam Wells, Lee C. Camp, Greg Boyd, and Amy Laura Hall among others, to answer these and other questions about Christian nonviolence:
- Does God expect nations to turn the other cheek?
- What about protecting the innocent?
- What about war and violence in the Old Testament?
- What about Hitler?
A Faith Not Worth Fighting For: Addressing Commonly Asked Questions about Christian Nonviolence attempts to explain why the nonviolent path of Jesus is an integral aspect of Christian discipleship. By addressing misconceptions about Christian pacifism, as well as real-life violent situations, this book will challenge the reader’s basic understanding of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. Stanley Hauerwas provides the foreword and Shane Claiborne, the afterword. This is the first volume in The Peaceable Kingdom Series, a multi-volume series that seeks to challenge the pervasive violence assumed necessary to humans, non-human animals, and the larger environment.
Contents
Foreword – Stanley Hauerwas
Introduction: Why Refusing to Kill Matters for Christian Discipleship – Justin Bronson Barringer and Tripp York
1 Isn’t Pacifism Passive? – C. Rosalee Velloso Ewell
2 What about the Protection of Third-Party Innocents? On Letting Your Neighbors Die – D. Stephen Long
3 What Would You Do if Someone Were Attacking a Loved One? – Amy Laura Hall and Kara Slade
4 What About Hitler? – Robert Brimlow
5 Must Christian Pacifists Reject Police Force? – Gerald W. Schlabach
6 What about Those Men and Women Who Gave Up Their Lives so that You and I Could Be Free? On Killing for Freedom – Justin Bronson Barringer
7 Does God Expect Nations to Turn the Other Cheek? – Gregory A. Boyd
8 What about War and Violence in the Old Testament? – Ingrid E. Lilly
9 What about Romans 13: “Let Every Soul Be Subject”? – Lee C. Camp
10 Didn’t Jesus Say He Came Not to Bring Peace, but a Sword? – Samuel Wells
11 What about the Centurion? A Roman Soldier’s Faith and Christian Pacifism – Andy Alexis-Baker
12 Didn’t Jesus Overturn Tables and Chase People Out of the Temple with a Whip? – John Dear
13 What about the Warrior Jesus in Revelation? “He Has Trampled Out the Vintage”? – J. Nelson Kraybill
Conclusion: A Faith Worth Dying For: A Tradition of Martyrs Not Heroes -Tripp York
Afterword – Shane Claiborne
