Daniel Larison in Minimum Daily Adult Requirement Christianity

…as it applies to War:

There are, broadly speaking, two camps who appeal to the just war tradition: those looking for loopholes that permit the use of force as often as possible, and those looking for barriers to prevent the use of force as often as practicable. The loophole crowd seems to start from the assumption that every use of force, particularly when employed by governments with whom they sympathize, is licit and just and that just war tradition exists to provide the language and borrowed authority for the arguments to support this view. The barrier crowd starts from the assumption that there has to be an extraordinarily high standard met before force can be used. Naturally, as someone in the latter crowd, I think that the purpose of the standards set forth in just war theory is to make it as difficult as possible to meet them, because war, while sometimes necessary, is a great evil. It should not be easy to go to war even in self-defense, much less should it be easy to escalate or start wars. For the loophole crowd, the reason for invoking just war theory seems to be mainly to gain the political benefits of being able to claim to being on the right side, and preferably without having to meet most of the obligations that just war theory requires (or to lower the standards for meeting those obligations such that virtually every operation will meet them no matter what happens).

Of course, scouring the Tradition for loopholes is not the sole province of war enthusiasts. Apologists for Queer Theory, abortion “rights”, serial monogamy and various other pelvic issues likewise have always tended to peer at obvious Church teaching with a gimlet eye and asked “How little of this can I get away with paying attention to and how can I construe it to mean whatever I want it to mean?” Enthusiasts for Communism and Capitalism have likewise often tended to play the game of “How much of this crap can I ignore and still plausibly call myself Christian?” with the Tradition.

This posture of asking “What’s the absolute bare minimum I have to believe or do?” (aka “Minimum Daily Adult Requirement Christianity“) constitutes the long tidal pull of concupiscence in the Church in the opposite direction from docility to Church teaching. It is informed by the spirit of antichrist and we must, by grace, fight it in ourselves every day.