FOOD FOR THOUGHT	LEPANTO — THE LAST CRUSADE
	Fr Francis Marsden
	For 4th Oct. 87

Wednesday’s feast of Our Lady of the Rosary commemorates, the greatest Christian sea-battle of our history: Lepanto in 1571, when the Papal Alliance smashed the Ottoman Turkish fleet and turned back the Islamic tide.

Was this a just war? Let us look at the dilemma then facing Catholic Europe. In 1454 the Ottoman Turks captured Byzantium, second city of Christendom, capital of the East, now Istanbul. Greek Christians fled to the west, or accepted Muslim rule and life. The first born son in every Christian family was taken away by the Turks, and brought up as a Muslim Janissary one of the Sultan’s private troops.
	I
Soon afterwards, the whole of the Balkans, Greece and Serbia fell to the Turkish armies. They advanced across the plains of Hungary to the gates of Vienna (1527). Saracen marauders ravaged the Italian coasts. Towns suffered constant threat of attack, burning, rape and pillage. At the Venetians’ treacherous suggestion, the Turks besieged Otranto (1480), Venice’s commercial rivals, killed 12,000 and martyred the 800 survivors who refused to convert to Islam.

Under Suleiman II (1530-64) the Ottoman Empire grew ever more menacing. Their navy seemed invincible. His degenerate successor Selim II proposed to conquer Rome. He boasted he would wrap the Pope’s head in a turban and fix the crescent of Islam atop St Peter’s dome.

Faced with an implacable and malevolent enemy,  what was to be done? “Turn the other cheek” (Matt. 5:39) or “If you save no sword, sell your cloak and buy one” (Luke 22:36)? Let more innocents be slaughtered? Draw the sword and die by the sword? Fight to keep one’s homeland free and preserve Christian civilization? Which is the path of love?

Pope St Pius V had little doubt. He launched a crusade, but from northern Europe he could get no help. France was torn by religious strife, bitter fruit of the Reformation. The German princes were divided. Elizabeth of England had broken with Rome and was consolidating her own state church. In Chesterton’s poetic words:

“The north is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes;
And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise.
And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty room
And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom
And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee
But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea.”
From the squabbling Catholic powers, the Pope managed to forge a precarious Holy Alliance with Spain and Venice.
	The Pope ordered extra vigils and fast-days in all Roman monasteries and convents in 1570. Parish confraternities and guilds were required to recite the Rosary daily. Pius V himself fasted two or three days per week for 18 months. If ever there was a holy war, this was to be it. The miracle was that the Spanish, Papal and Venetian fleets united under a single commander, Don John of Austria.

The combined fleet sailed from Messina in Sicily late in September 1571. They sheltered at Sami, Kefalonia. On October 6th scouts sighted the Turkish fleet of 208 galleys in the Gulf of Lepanto, off the Greek coast. They prepared to attack the next day.

On every ship the banner of the Cross was hoisted. Priests blessed, absolved and proclaimed the plenary indulgence for all the troops. Don John leapt from ship to ship, crucifix aloft in hand, encouraging the soldiers. They sailed forward to attack. The last medieval Crusade was in action.

Cannons roared, swords and scimitars flashed9 boarding parties grappled, the reek of gunpowder and burning ships. filled the air. By evening the Turkish fleet drifted in ruins, 15 ships sunk, 177 taken, 25,000 men dead or captured. The Holy Alliance had lost 17 ships and 7,500 men, but released 15,000 Christian galley-slaves. Eyewitnesses reported that the sea turned red with blood, choked with floating corpses and shattered timbers.

A thousand miles away in Rome, Pius V was discussing finances with his cardinals that afternoon. Suddenly, around 5.00 pm  he rose and went to the window. For several minutes, he stared up at the sky. Eventually he turned back, his eyes full of tears, and said, “Let us thank God for the victory he has granted to the arms of the Christians.” He had had a vision of the victory.

This same news reached Rome by conventional means a fortnight later. In thanksgiving, the Pope added the title “Help of Christians” to the Litany of Our Lady, and instituted Wednesday’s feast. Pius V believed the battle was won by prayer as much as by force of arms.

In our age such a military and chivalrous Christianity is unfashionable. It costs us nothing to scorn the crusades. It is easy in peacetime to denounce war. We have not had to face their situation, yet we like to sit in judgment upon them.

Was Lepanto justified? Does God still fight with his chosen people, as in the Old Testament?

Theologians reason that a war may be just if it fulfils all the following conditions:
1.	It defends against an unjust aggressor who threatens the vital goods of a state community (territory, trade, justice, moral and religious freedom). The existence of a just cause for war must be morally certain.
2.	Every possible means of peaceful settlement has been exhausted.
3.	War must not jeopardize higher goods (e.g. truth, freedom) than those it is defending.
4.	Military action is limited to just defence and reclaiming violated rights. Punitive reprisals are immoral.

5.	Only legitimate means of defence are used (e.g. no chemical weapons) and must cause no more evil than is necessary for their purpose.
Meissner  (Social Ethics pp. 665-6) continues, “War can become a right or even a duty when the highest goods of the state community . . . are in danger from an aggressor.”

No true Christian actually wants war. It involves fearful evils. Too often, it is the devil’s playground. Yet, heroism and self-sacrifice can shine through the brutality and barbarism. .

The victory of Lepanto is a world removed from modern nuclear war. Could that ever be justified?