the author of a short story. It's set after a virus has wiped out most of humanity, an order of monks are in charge and somehow they can bring back dead people (or maybe some form of reincarnation..my memory is a bit vague). The main character has flashbacks to being in the military and in a nuclear bunker, at the end he launches a nuclear missile and he is asked why he is going to kill loads of people to which he replies that they have all died before.
I read the story in an anthology in the 70's.