305. How Do Great Stories Help Us Prepare for War-Time?

“And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.” That’s what the Lord Jesus promised His disciples. How does His word, with support from fantastical fiction, help us prepare for armed conflicts across our real world?

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Quotes and notes

The main relevant fact admitted by all parties is that war is very disagreeable. The main contention urged as fact by Pacifists would be that wars always do more harm than good. How is one to find out whether this is true? It belongs to a class of historical generalisations which involve a comparison between the actual consequences of some actual event and a consequence which might have followed if that event had not occurred.

“Wars do no good” involves the proposition that if the Greeks had yielded to Xerxes and the Romans to Hannibal, the course of history ever since would have been perhaps better, but certainly no worse than it actually has been; that a Mediterranean world in which Carthaginian power succeeded Persian would have been at least as good and happy and as fruitful for all posterity as the actual Mediterranean world in which Roman power succeeded Greek.

My point is not that such an opinion seems to me overwhelmingly improbable. My point is that both opinions are merely speculative; there is no conceivable way of convincing a man of either.

C. S. Lewis, “Why Am I Not A Pacifist”

1. Great stories show us that war is hell.

• Answer to Stephen’s earlier question: all great stories need conflict.
• Without any conflict, no fights, battles, war, sin, we’d have no story.
• (Side thought: without the Fall, fiction as we know it couldn’t exist.)
• Yes, we do love stories that are so focused on war that the word is right in the title: Star Wars, World of Warcraft, Warhammer 40,000.
• But it’s vital for stories to show conflict/war as somewhat realistic.
• People die and do not return. Wounds hurt. War-“glory” is fleeting.
• And of course, folks start or fight in wars for very corrupt reasons.

2. Stories also show wars can be necessary.

• God Himself, as Author of the Story, allowed/planned for conflict.
• The very existence of fiction reminds us conflict serves a purpose.
• Folks uncomfortable with war often find ways to like these stories.
• This might indicate that even they know conflict has some purpose.
• Few critics would reasonably dispute (by faithful in-universe terms) the justifiable causes of the Federation, Fremen, or Men of Gondor.
• Deep Christian traditions of “just war theory” often supports them.
• Villains have many motives, but often can be stopped only by force.

3. Best of all, stories help us long for peace.

• Having shown war as hell,