The question of war in the social doctrine of the Catholic Church through the prism of the events of Russia's war against Ukraine and in the current theological reflections of ukrainian catholics

Abstract

The article analyzes the provisions on war in the social doctrine of the Catholic Church through the prism of the events of Russia's war against Ukraine and in the current theological reflections of Ukrainian Catholics. The purpose of the article is to clarify the possibilities of practical application of these provisions of the Catholic social doctrine in the situation of modern war in view of the assessment of their practical implementation by representatives of the RCC and UGCC in the context of today's war chronicle. The scientific novelty of the article is due to the consideration of doctrinal instructions regarding war, taking into account their evaluations by representatives of Catholics in today's Ukraine, who ponder theoretical questions "from the middle" of the practical experience of citizens of a country, against which the enemy has unleashed a brutal war. After all, only one's own experience of living in specific situations makes it possible to fully assess the degree of adequacy of theoretical provisions - actual reality. The achievement of scientific novelty is summarized in the conclusions: the corpus of the Compendium of Social Doctrine in its modern presentation (since 2004), as well as encyclicals and other documents of the Catholic Church of the 19th and 20th centuries, written by people who are representatives of the Euro-Atlantic cultural and civilization circle . Therefore, despite the potential of universality and timelessness (at least within the framework of the Christian worldview), these instructions can be understood and accepted rather by the recipients of the same circle, and do not take into account the entire mental complex of those who are actually outside it. That is probably why, similar to the written postulates of international organizations, the avant-garde builders of which are mainly the representative states of this same circle, the instructions of the Catholic social doctrine may not fully "work" in all situations of military conflicts. In particular, as it is now obvious, Russia has learned to use in its own interests fairly and humanely written laws and guidelines, secular and ecclesiastical, and to brutally violate them, to which both in the Catholic social doctrine and in the documents of international organizations, in the end, only one answer remains - armed power.