Rarely does one encounter a text that approaches Christian doctrine on war with as much clarity and energy as David L. Clough and Brian Stiltiner's Faith and Force. The authors, a Methodist preacher and a Catholic theologian, struggle with some of the more difficult Christian deliberations regarding war. They do so by grappling with current topics from humanitarian intervention, nuclear proliferation, and counterterrorism to the ongoing war in Iraq.

The volume's delightful innovation lies in the dialectic technique used to approach these topics: At the end of each chapter, the authors engage in a brief back and forth, arguing over the most contentious issues raised in the preceding pages. The authors represent competing strands of Christian thought on war: Clough identifies with the pacifist stance whereas Stiltner is an adherent of just war theory. These dialogue segments, as well as the book's inviting introductory style, lend the text a refreshing, even exciting feel. Yet this accessibility comes at a price: Faith and War is limited in its scope, removed from related work in political science and modest in its aspirations.

Instead of a comprehensive study of the relationship between faith and war suggested in its title, this volume offers an analysis of a narrow subset of issues related to ethical/religious stances on the conduct of war. Missing is any thorough investigation of the use of religion as a motivator for war, the effect of faith on military practices, the congruence of religious and military leadership or organization, or the waging of war for religious objectives (such as relics or sacred spaces). Faith and Force also neglects to address some of the most pressing issues in the contemporary study of ethics and war, such as the challenges of jus post-bellum, the moral repercussions of new weapon systems such as tactical nuclear weapons or “bunker buster” bombs, or the permissibility of torture.

The book's title misleads for a second reason: This is not merely a “Christian Debate” but a debate intended for a Christian audience. Although the authors claim otherwise (5), they also state their explicit aim as being “to illuminate what is at stake … for Christians and for churches” (4). A characteristic segment reminds pacifist readers that “the reign of God inaugurated by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ is not yet fully realized” (243). Such language blurs the line between objective analysis, the unwitting introduction of belief posing as argument, and a profession of faith on the part of the authors.

Religion clearly takes the lead over politics in Faith and Force, not only because of the use of pious prose but also because of the monopoly of theological sources consulted and invoked. The authors seem relatively disinterested in drawing on the rich international relations literature on nuclear weapons, the causes of civil wars, or the challenges of military intervention, for example, even as they discuss the very issues in which this literature is steeped. It is discomforting to witness the authors struggling to describe trends in nonproliferation, for example, without recourse to the significant social-constructivist literature on norms dedicated to this topic. The most influential contemporary thinkers on war and faith, including Samuel Huntington, Douglass Johnston, Martin Marty, and Scott Appleby, are conspicuous in their absence.

Whether this is a conscious decision by the authors, concerned that undue influence from political science might blur their theological focus, or the result of unawareness that such sources exist, remains unclear, but the results are often cumbersome. In one passage, the authors suggest: “a good analogy for the current international system is a nation without a police force” (103), a discussion that proceeds with no mention of Thomas Hobbes or the term “anarchy.” A lengthy discussion on the spread of democracy as a justification for war fails to make even oblique references to democratic peace theory. Elsewhere, the authors misrepresent the basic assumptions of the Prisoners' Dilemma (110–111), erroneously proclaim that no states have adopted the “no first nuclear use” stance (135), and inadvertently frame the wrong man for the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (151).

Even within the narrow scope that this volume has set itself, its achievements are modest. The authors are adept at tracing just war principles to their religious foundations and clarifying the theological underpinnings of these foundations, yet they make no substantive contribution that can advance this body of theory beyond the seminal text on this topic, Michael Walzer's Just and Unjust Wars. The authors rely frequently on Walzer's thirty-year-old source, which sought to supplant Christian just war theory with a secular just war theory for the modern age. Rather than moving that debate onto new grounds, Clough and Stiltner seem intent on reverting the theory to its religious origins.

Faith and Force offers an elementary introduction to just war theory that is uniquely engaging. Although some political scientists may not find this text to be sufficiently thought provoking, it certainly merits consideration as an effective teaching tool.