Prayers and war and who God listens to

Prayer and its relation to war, mercy, justice, and who is the pray-er has been getting a lot of attention in the news in the last few weeks.

One prayer that got a lot of coverage, voiced in late March after a reading from Psalms 18:37-42, was said to have been composed by a chaplain before the US raid on Venezuela: “Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation. Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.”

The modern prayer is not so different than the quoted section of Psalms, which uses language such as "my assailants sink under me" and "those who hated me I destroyed." All this seems a stark contrast to a prayer and a citation offered just days later, this time by Pope Leo at Mass on Palm Sunday, who in his homily meditated on Jesus, King of Peace, who "revealed the gentle face of God." 

Let's go straight to the matter of whether God really doesn't listen to some prayers. In a strict sense, God listens to all prayers, in that He knows all our prayers, spoken and unspoken — He is omniscient, after all. The Bible, and in particular the Old Testament, often describes God in metaphorical ways to bring out a more important truth. God the Father is unchanging and is pure spirit, so He does not actually, for example, change His mind, nor is He literally jealous, to take two famous descriptions from the Old Testament. These tell us, rather, about God’s will for His people, which among other things is always to turn from their sinful ways.

Isaiah, quoted by Pope Leo, was a prophet, and his message is a prophetic one. Prophecy is not fortune-telling, but a re-orienting of God’s people toward a fundamental truth, often by showing the consequences of their evil ways, so that they may repent. 

The Pope’s application of that striking verse in Isaiah to the present geopolitical context should also be understood as a prophetic statement, a call to conversion from the evils of war. It is also a message about how prayer is itself no guarantee of success, especially if our prayers are motivated by hate or thirst for blood.

Some people have suggested that the wars of the Old Testament, or indeed Psalms like the one above, are proof that wars can be waged in God’s name. 

But as explained in Part 1, the Pope’s words should not be taken as rejecting just war theory, nor the prayers of truly just wartime leaders who are scrupulous in the methods they employ. We need to understand the Pope as saying that, whatever the theory of just war, in reality many leaders in the world today are not pursuing a just war. And those who not only wage an unjust war but also use God’s name to justify it are effectively blaspheming against God, the King of Peace. 

Secondly, the conduct of the Israelites in the Old Testament cannot be taken as a straightforward model for us today, nor can it be plucked out of context. As Christians reading the Old Testament, we ought to be startled by the violence we find, even when it is seemingly condoned by God. But we also need to see the bigger picture: God is speaking to His people through the cultural norms of their day, which included wars of conquest and violence, fought with the methods of the time (so very different than our AI-driven weapons and nuclear arms of mass destruction). 

God’s people need time to be prepared for the New Testament message of peace and spiritual fulfillment, so God works through the imperfections of His people, including their violence, to accomplish His will, while slowly calling them to a higher standard of peace and of spiritual rather than material fulfillment. It is a progressive pedagogy.

Hence, we read in the First Book of Chronicles (22:8-9) that God says to King David: “You have shed much blood and have fought many wars. You are not to build a house for my Name, because you have shed much blood on the earth in my sight. But you will have a son who will be a man of peace and rest, and I will give him rest from all his enemies on every side."

In subsequent public discussions, the emphasis has changed to praying for soldiers. Can we pray for soldiers? Yes, and we should.

It is helpful to think of prayer as not being mere petition to God but a dialogue with God, and indeed an openness and docility to the Holy Spirit, who seeks to change and purify us continually through prayer. Mother Teresa famously said that “we cannot love one another unless we pray, for prayer gives a clean heart.” We find references to a clean or pure heart in both the Psalms and in the Beatitudes, because that is the aim of prayer — a heart purified from sinful attachments and attitudes. For some people this may be lust, for others, hatred and vengeance. A clean heart moves us away from asking for the things we want (which may be wrong), to asking for the things that please God. 

Furthermore, prayer helps us to go beyond our own limitations, and be “joined to the infinite possibilities of God” in order to “break the demonic cycle of evil,” as Pope Leo said during the global prayer vigil for peace.

One of those limitations we need to overcome is the constant polarization involved in politics, of seeing one side or one country as all evil and one’s own side or country as all good. That is a harmful mentality that makes us blind to the evil we are capable of and blind to the humanity of others. Just as in prayer we examine our own consciences, we also need to examine honestly the deeds of our own nation. 

All this applies as much to our prayers regarding war as to anything else. 

We can always pray for soldiers, that they may be kept safe, that they may be wise and upright in their actions. But if we find ourselves praying for vengeance and merciless destruction on our enemies, then such prayer does not come from a clean heart, from one that has begun to examine his conscience. It does not proceed from openness to the Word of God, who tells us in the Gospels that we must love our enemies, who are also made in God's image, and seek gentleness and righteousness. Prayers that are opposed to the nature and will of God Himself will not find favor with Him, and that fundamentally explains the Pope’s words. 

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Dr Michael Wee is a Catholic philosopher and bioethicist. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford. He has been a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life since 2020.