A Declaration on Peace: In God's People the World's Renewal Has Begun - Softcover

John Howard Yoder (1927-1997) taught ethics and theology as a professor at Notre Dame University and Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary. He received his doctorate from the University of Basel, Switzerland, and was a member of the Mennonite Church in Elkhart, Indiana.

A Declaration on Peace is a brief, passionate plea for dialogue among Christians on issues crucial to our time. The authors argue that in God's people, the world's renewal has begun. They seek not a debate among Christians about pacifism but an energized reflection on what it really means to be God's people in a world filled with war, weapons, and militaristic assertions of national self-interest. --The Other Side

Spokespersons of the classic peace churches (Friends or Quakers, Brethren, Mennonite, the Fellowship of Reconciliation) step forward from the biblical background to persuade us that war can never be justified biblically. We must rethink the just war theory. --The Bible Today

When read alongside other denominational peace statements one profound difference emerges: the ecclesiology underlying the argument for peace is unique. This statement argues that the church as church exercises its moral mandate by being the faithful people of God, thereby preparing the way for the Lord to redeem a sinful world. Peace statements by churches other than the Historic Peace Churches tend to distinguish between how the church functions internally as church and how it must function outside its own bounds when confronted with power politics of a different order. One implies a pacifist lifestyle even when war does not threaten; the other implies pacifism only when war itself threatens the survival of the human race.
This is a timely and significant theological contribution to the ecumenical dialogue on war and peace. --Mennonite Quarterly Review