SATISH SHARMA - not just Rotigraphy.: Tom Nichols spent nearly 20 years teaching just war theory at Harvard. He is precise about what Vance got wrong.

https://x.com/micyoung75/status/2044891331403849941

Tom Nichols spent nearly 20 years teaching just war theory at Harvard. He is precise about what Vance got wrong.

The just war tradition does not tell Christians when God is on their side. It regards war as evil and every life taken - ally or enemy - as a tragedy. Its conditions - just cause, right intention, proportionality, last resort - are not a permission slip. They are questions a leader must answer before risking his mortal soul by sending people to die.

After Vance's remarks, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops doctrine chairman put it in writing: Pope Leo is not offering opinions. He is exercising his ministry as Vicar of Christ. That is Bishop Massa's clarification, addressed directly to this situation.

Vance told the pope that theology should be "anchored in truth." Nichols identifies that phrase correctly: it means nothing. Whose truth? The bishop of Rome, whom Catholics believe speaks with charism on matters of faith and morals, was told by a recent convert that he should go do his theology homework.

The Catholic tradition Vance cited has a name for this disposition. Pope Gregory the Great called pride the queen of all vices. The Latin word is superbia. Proverbs 16:18 has been in the text considerably longer than the Iran war.

Quote

Tom Nichols

@RadioFreeTom

13h

Vance has now seized the top seat in the Death of Expertise Hall of Fame: He has lectured the pope—the pope, the leader of a billion and a half Catholics—about being too sloppy with theology.  

The queen of all vices: Pride.

https://theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/pope-jd-vance-iran/686826/?gift=otEsSHbRYKNfFYMngVFweHy9SD0JbKaGwVNdctV4EaI&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share