According to recent reporting, both the U.S. and Israeli militaries are preparing for renewed missile strikes in Iran in early November, on the heels of important elections in both countries. 

The editors of Commonweal have repeatedly criticized the U.S.-led war in Iran as unwise and unjustifiable. Besides being illegal, it has already ballooned the national debt domestically and tarnished the reputation of the United States abroad. The casualty count stands at around 10,000 killed and wounded, a figure that excludes the deaths of roughly 2,000 Iranian civilians. 

On this episode, Commonweal senior correspondent Heidi Schlumpf speaks with Archbishop John Wester of Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

Wester has been among the most outspoken religious leaders not only about the immorality of the war in Iran, but modern warfare itself.

All wars, Wester argues, are failures: not only of diplomacy, but of our duty to live out the nonviolent demands of Jesus Christ as expressed in the Gospels. 

For further reading: 

• The editors on Pete Hegseth’s disastrous leadership
• Heidi Schlumpf on the Catholic Military Conference
• The editors on the immorality of the Iran War