The idea that any action, however extreme or disruptive or even murderous, is justified if it averts failure or defeat for a particular belief or a particular religious group is not really consistent with the conviction that our failure does not mean God’s failure. Indeed, it reveals a fundamental lack of conviction in the eternity and sufficiency of the object of faith.
Religious violence suggests an underlying religious insecurity. When different communities have the same sort of conviction of the absolute truth of their perspective, there is certainly an intellectual and spiritual challenge to be met; but the logic of this belief ought to make it plain that there can be no justification for the sort of violent contest in which any means, however inhuman, can be justified by appeal to the need to â??protect Godâ??s interestsâ??. Even to express it in those terms is to show how absurd it is. The eternal God cannot need â??protectionâ?? by the tactics of human violence. This point is captured in the words of Jesus before the Roman governor: â??My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fightâ?? (John 19.36).
Archbishop of Canterbury – Response to ‘A Common Word between Us’
