A Catechism of Defending The Crusades and other Aspects of the Medieval World Part IV

Objection 13: The Crusades were fought by greedy lords that desired land and money above faith.
 Response: Again, this can go back to judging men's hearts. Based on their actions, some crusaders no doubt did it for wrong reasons. However, many crusaders did it for the reasons of the faith including, but no limited too, the brave and pious Godfrey of Bouillon. After being elected king after the capture of Jerusalem by the crusaders in 1099, Godfrey refused the title, possibly taking the the ''Defender of the Holy Sepulcher,'' instead. Godfrey also refused ''To wear a golden crown where his Savior had worn a Crown of Thorns.'' Godfrey was not alone, many others crusaders were also pious and brave, and their actions implicated these traits with how they defended the weak.

 Further Sources: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam by Robert Spencer.
 Objection 14: We should love like Christ did instead of hate.
 Response: Absolutely, and that is why the crusades were needed! The Muslims did not change when the Franciscans tried to convert them in the fourteenth century. If it had not been for the crusades, the Muslims would have man-slaughtered Latin Christians all the ways into the deep west. One of the evidences of this fact, is that all the eastern churches which did not call for a crusade against the Muslims eventually lost all of their lands. Christ never preached pacifism, but rather that He came to earth on behalf of sinners.

 Sources: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam and The Crusades by Robert Spencer.

 Objection 15: Even if the Crusades were right, shouldn't we just avoid talking about good about them?
 Response: Truth does not change, though culture does. Sexual immorality and abortion are now accepted by many professing Christians though all Christians would have abhorred it before the 1930s. Christians should be proud of the heroes of the faith that lived before us, and we Western Christians should honor the roots of our faith in Western Civilization, knowing that it has held more firmly to Christianity than any other Civilization in the history of the world.
 We ought to expect the world to hate us, as it hated our Lord first. Let us not conform truth to soften Christianity for this very anti-Christian world we now live in.

Objection 16: Should the crusaders have given the Holy Land to the Jews as the Jews are God's chosen people?
 Response: First off, who are the Jews? Many of the Jews in Medieval Art had red hair and there has been some theories that the Jews settled in Northern Europe such as Scotland and other countries. Still, this question is hugely important, and whether one is Dispnsationalist, or believes in replacement theology, this needs to be addressed. For obvious reasons, this question and answer may only be applicable to those of the Zionist beliefs.
 Saint Bernard may share some light on this issue, as he refers to the Jews as God's chosen people despite the fact that he took part in the second crusade of 1147-1149. Here are his actual words:
 ''It is noble of you to wish to go forth against the Ishmaelites; still, whoever, touches a Jew as to lay hands on his life, does something as sinful as he had laid hands on Jesus Himself! My disciple, Rudolph, who has spoken against them to exterminate them, has preached only unrighteousness, for concerning them stands written in the book of Psalms, "Do not kill them, let my people not be forgotten!'' {Psalm 58}.
 Bernard also wrote this second letter to clergy in France: 
 ''We have heard, and we are gladdened, that the zeal of God renders you fervent, but is absolutely necessarily that the moderating rule of knowledge be not lacking. The Jews must not be persecuted,  they must not be slain, they are not even to be put to flight. Put you quires to those divine pages; I have known what is said in the Psalm as a prophecy concerning the Jews, says the church; ''as for my enemies, do not kill them, let my people not be forgotten.'' {Same Psalm as above}.

So even in these passages, Saint Bernard sees the Jews as God's chosen people even though he is a crusader. The fact that the crusaders wanted to establish a Christendom on earth, largely based on Augustine's City of God, does not take away any theological implications that one may interpret being found in the scriptures as applied to the Jews.
 Sources: The Popes and the Jews in the Middle Ages by Edward A. Synan.

Objection 17: Were not Indulgences abused during the crusades?
Response: First of all this would again not prove that the crusades were morally wrong. Second of all, while indulgences go back to the days of the early church, the payment of them is another story. Third, indulgences reached their height of abuse just shortly before the Protestant Reformation, which was centuries after the crusades to the holy land were over with. Besides of all of this, the topic of indulgences deserves another whole discussion.

 Objection 18: The church does not have the right to wage a war, but the state does.
 Response: Says who? Scripture does not teach this. As shepherds of the Christian flocks, the popes felt the responsibility and urge to encourage the nobility to go on the crusades. Though peasants also volunteered by thousands for the first crusade, the pope did not intend crusading to go for them.
 It is interesting to note that even deacons helped the Americans fight America's War of Independence against Britain. This concept of churches can't call upon clergy to assist or help in a war, or that clergy should say nothing about promoting people to go to war, is alien to the Holy Scriptures. Finally, the pope did not commands the armies of the kingdoms of Europe; the nobility did. But the pope did see himself as head of all Christians which also explains his morale involvement in the affairs of Europe. While the Templars and Hospitallers were at the disposal of the church, many crusaders were actually soldiers of their own kingdoms.

 Objection 19: Why did the popes force their Christian religion upon the Muslims?
 Response: This has already been answered. Not once in his speech at Clermont France in July of 1095, did the pope command Christians to force Muslims into Christianity, contrary to myth and media.

 Objection 20: What about the Crusades fought against heretics in Europe?

 Response: The word ''crusade'' has become over time quite broad meaning essentially any holy war. Whether or not you agree with them, Roman Catholics and many Protestants alike, historically burned those that they deemed heretics at the stake. This was all done because of the worldview on their part. To many Christians of the past, leaving a heretic alive, would allow heresy to spread and kill a soul. Heresy, the killing of the soul, was seen as more evil than the killing of the body. The Puritans of the seventeenth century felt they had to drive the ''papist,'' from their land. Some have called these Puritan conquest crusades as well. Saint Augustine supported punishing anyone that did not hold to the Catholic Faith, and it would be hard to ignore the Augustinian influence on Medieval Latin Civilization.

 Further Sources: The Political Writings by Saint Augustine of Hippo, England and The Crusades: 1095-1588 by Christopher Tyerman, Ireland 1649-52: Cromwell's Protestant Crusade by Michael McNally and Graham Turner, Cromwell: The Portrait of a Soldier by John Gillingham.