The Church and the War

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Karl Barth. The Church and the War

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THE CHURCH AND THE WAR

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3. The sole function of the Church is to preach the Word of God and bear witness to the Lordship of Christ. This involves, of course, the definite confession of Him as “the One who has come to us as Son of God and Saviour and will come again”; it also involves “the actualizing of this confession in definite decisions” with reference to contemporary problems. In order to “actualize” her confession the Church must preach the Word of God, not in vacuo but in terms that are clearly relevant to men in the concrete historical circumstances in which they are placed. To bear faithful witness to Christ must bring the Church into a relationship to questions which are agitating both Christians and the world “here and now at the present moment.”

4. The State, as well as the Church, has its own important and indispensable place in the Divine economy. Part of the Lordship of Christ is exercised through the “righteous” (or “just”) State, whose function is to maintain order and justice as against the chaos and injustice to which man’s sinful nature makes him prone. The State would fail in its duty as “an appointed minister of God” if it failed to defend right against wrong—if necessary, by the use of force.

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