none, the CCC is clear. I believe there are DP-eligible convicts whose guilt is unquestionable which satisfies that part of the rule.I have a question for you. How many innocent deaths ordered through errors in capital punishment is acceptable to you?
you’ve been misrepresenting my argument repeatedly now. there are instances where the guilt of convicts is unquestionable. the CCC acknowledges this explicitly.
- One poster keeps referring to the protection of the innocent in reference to imprisoned gang members still in control of fellow gang members; yet offers no thoughts on innocents affected through error of the capital punishment system in place. Why is one group of innocents an acceptable loss and the other has no acceptable losses?..
No evasion. I believe I answered that in my last post.none, the CCC is clear. I believe there are DP-eligible convicts whose guilt is unquestionable which satisfies that part of the rule.
how many innocent deaths are your prepared to accept at the hands of DP-eligible convicts whose lives you insist must be preserved?
don’t evade this question.
Westerby
I don’t see a number. How many innocent deaths are you willing to accept at the hands of DP eligible convicts?No evasion. I believe I answered that in my last post.
Brother, it’s best we stop our parts to each other in the discussion. Either we’re not conveying our thoughts successfully, or there is a deliberate spin being applied. I apologize for any confusion on my part. I have not said that all DP convicts are innocent, and I really don’t understand what your someone being guilty of a non-death penalty offense statement means.you’ve been misrepresenting my argument repeatedly now. there are instances where the guilt of convicts is unquestionable. the CCC acknowledges this explicitly.
you make a very deceptive argument when you say that because some people not deserving of death (they might well be guilty of a non-death penalty offense) are executed, that all DP convicts are “innocent” as you put it.
Westerby
My additions in bold.I think everyone understands what the Catechism says; the dispute is over whether the teaching is prudential or doctrinal. If it is prudential (as surely seems the case) then we may be morally justified in disagreeing with it.** In extremely rare cases.**
Most of the practical arguments for using capital punishment are made in response to practical arguments made against its use and these inevitably arise because the Catechism itself gives a practical reason for its use: when it is necessary to protect society.
In rare cases and so should be virtually non-existent in the West. Complete the sentences Ender.
These arguments are certainly valid but they are not moral, they are practical. I am less interested in them because they have nothing to do with Church teaching on the subject. I am primarily concerned with the moral aspects of capital punishment.
**Practical arguments can be very moral. If CP is cheaper than a proper reform of the system then that is not a moral argument for CP. Here’s a dirty little secret. Abortion has lowered the crime rate in America. It is far cheaper than reform, education, incarceration and CP. It would be expedient to promote abortion therefore for the good of society. **
No on argues that it is a cure for societal ills. The primary argument for its use is to satisfy the obligation of justice.
Though the Pope urges us to do so rarely an only in extreme circumstances. The Pope did not referenced Justice at all. Indeed it is Just that we ALL should die for our sins.
Ender
Every life is precious. We cannot legislate morality in the hearts of men.I don’t see a number. How many innocent deaths are you willing to accept at the hands of DP eligible convicts?
That’s a simple question, it deserves a straightforward answer.
as in “one”, “seven hundred” …
Westerby
I asked: … How many innocent deaths are you willing to accept at the hands of DP eligible convicts?Every life is precious. We cannot legislate morality in the hearts of men.
IF YOU MAKE THE ARGUMENT that we should not use capital punishment because innocent people may be executed THEN you must compare the number of innocents who were executed with the number of innocents murdered because the guilty were not executed.
- One poster keeps referring to the protection of the innocent in reference to imprisoned gang members still in control of fellow gang members; yet offers no thoughts on innocents affected through error of the capital punishment system in place. Why is one group of innocents an acceptable loss and the other has no acceptable losses?
There is a sense in which this is true but it’s not as simple as that. Aquinas addressed this:*"**A wise workman chooses a less evil in order to prevent a greater, as the surgeon cuts off a limb to save the whole body. But divine wisdom inflicts [punishment] to prevent fault. Therefore fault is a greater evil than [punishment]." *(ST I,48-6, OTC)In my honest opinion, executions are directly repaying an evil for an evil, or an eye for an eye.
Yes, well I have trouble with that concept as well. That is, however, how it is presented in the Catechism.We’ve all heard the Church teaches ‘no evil can be done to accomplish good.’ To me, we kill someone, an evil, so that innocents maybe protected, a good.
There are others who believe that way as well. Professor Christian Brugger wrote: “*The new framework leads me to conclude that the Catechism is laying a theoretical foundation for a change (not “development” precisely understood) in the Church’s teaching on the death penalty…” *I’ll repeat once more, doctrines develop and I believe we’re seeing a development in our lifetime.
I’ve never heard the term “digger”, cool, I’ll store that away. I’ve been in more than a few federal and state pens, never had a reason to arm wrestle anyone though.Wesserby: have you ever been in the digger?
It’s very hard to commit any crime when you are wearing babydolls, and are locked up 23 hours a day in solitary and have no access to a phone.
I used to visit (and arm-wrestle) with inmates in the digger (admin seg) when I was a prison chaplain.
They wear an asbetos blanket (or did when I was there), and have only a mattress in their cell - no blankets, no pillow, no books, no windows, no phone, no TV, no eating utensils, no paper or pencil, no nothin’.
You don’t have to kill someone to render them powerless.
This is a fairly common sentiment and it goes to what I see as a serious problem with the the position on the death penalty taken in the Catechism.I can vote to abolish the death penalty up until I think about someone like Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma bomber. 168 dead, of which 19 were children under 6 years of age, 680 people injured… I think that there are crimes that push society to punish the individuals responsible with loss of life.
I would blame TV for that, not the catechism.This is a fairly common sentiment and it goes to what I see as a serious problem with the the position on the death penalty taken in the Catechism.
Most people believe there are crimes so heinous that the perpetrator deserves to die, that only death is sufficiently punitive. What this says is that we have lost our sense of the awful nature of the crime of murder when we believe that killing only one person does not cross the “heinous” threshold but only the killing of hundreds. This is probably why we see the question of capital punishment so differently from our predecessors. They saw murder as a more grievous sin than we do.*Of these remedies {for the disease of murder} the most efficacious is to form a just conception of the wickedness of murder. The enormity of this sin is manifest from many and weighty passages of Holy Scripture. So much does God abominate homicide that He declares in Holy Writ that of the very beast of the field He will exact vengeance for the life of man, commanding the beast that injures man to be put to death. And if (the Almighty) commanded man to have a horror of blood, He did so for no other reason than to impress on his mind the obligation of entirely refraining, both in act and desire, from the enormity of homicide. *(Catechism of Trent)
We no longer have that just conception of the wickedness of murder.
Ender
OK - truth be told - I would treat terrorists (if they are terrorists and not combatants in war) differently.I’ve never heard the term “digger”, cool, I’ll store that away. I’ve been in more than a few federal and state pens, never had a reason to arm wrestle anyone though.
convicts in the US always have access to legal counsel and communications are privileged. its a constitutional right that the government treads very lightly around. this is from the wikipedia article on lynn stewart, an attorney indicted for, among other things, passing information from her imprisoned terrorist client to terrorist organizations on the outside. she was under “special administrative measures” written to limit attorney-client privilege abuse. it didn’t work:
“Stewart was accused in the indictment of passing Rahman’s blessing for a resumption of terrorist operations to Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya members in Egypt after they inquired whether they should continue to honor a ceasefire agreement with the Egyptian government.[23] According to video surveillance of Rahman’s cell Stewart, Yousry and Rahman had been tricking the guards into believing that Stewart and Rahman were having a routine conversation relating to his case, when Rahman was dictating statements to Yousry with Stewart joking that she should get an award for acting.[8][24]”
Westerby
They have remained constant. The statements of Blessed JP2 and Benedict the XVI represent their own prudential judgement and are not binding on the faithful. Their own words belie any claim to the contrary.I guess I can’t buy the appeal to “tradition” as well. Tradition speaks to theological and moral ideas which remain fairly consistent.
No he most certainly did not. It is a popular misunderstanding purported by those who wish to deny Church Tradition, but it remains an inaccurate representation of the facts. Its also a logical fallacy to suggest that because someone was wrong about one thing, we can ignore what they said on others. This is even worse when claiming that because one saint was wrong about something we don’t have to hold Sacred Tradition as authoritative.The practical day to day, so to speak, it really doesn’t. Thomas Aquinas denies the possibility of the Immaculate Conception.
I read some of legal analysis on the killing of OBL, one side taking a judicial position, the other as a military action. fascinating. tough call, from the monday morning quarterbacking position. I defer to the guys on the ground.OK - truth be told - I would treat terrorists (if they are terrorists and not combatants in war) differently.
BTW Wesserby - were you an honourable schoolboy?
I don’t feel that I have lost my sense of the seriousness of a single act of murder by feeling that hundreds of murders are worse than one. I feel that every murder is an outrageous crime but not every murderer should be given the death penalty – so yes I need a way to process the crime of murder by degree and the message being sent by society.This is a fairly common sentiment and it goes to what I see as a serious problem with the the position on the death penalty taken in the Catechism.
Most people believe there are crimes so heinous that the perpetrator deserves to die, that only death is sufficiently punitive. What this says is that we have lost our sense of the awful nature of the crime of murder when we believe that killing only one person does not cross the “heinous” threshold but only the killing of hundreds. This is probably why we see the question of capital punishment so differently from our predecessors. They saw murder as a more grievous sin than we do.*Of these remedies {for the disease of murder} the most efficacious is to form a just conception of the wickedness of murder. The enormity of this sin is manifest from many and weighty passages of Holy Scripture. So much does God abominate homicide that He declares in Holy Writ that of the very beast of the field He will exact vengeance for the life of man, commanding the beast that injures man to be put to death. And if (the Almighty) commanded man to have a horror of blood, He did so for no other reason than to impress on his mind the obligation of entirely refraining, both in act and desire, from the enormity of homicide. *(Catechism of Trent)
We no longer have that just conception of the wickedness of murder.
Ender
The reason I lay (at least some of) the blame on the catechism is because it changed the nature of the debate about capital punishment. The conversation is no longer about justice but about protection so the whole discussion has changed from one concerned about what punishment is commensurate with the crime of murder to what is needed to protect society. There is no longer a need to discuss the crime itself since that is no longer even considered in determining how to justly punish it.I would blame TV for that, not the catechism.