The CCC gives a quick broad statement but doesn’t go into detail about the death penalty. It only takes a little bit from Pope John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life) encyclical. Did you also read the recommended reading that Michelle Arnold listed such as the article written by Jimmy Akin which takes the subject more in-depth?
I really don’t know what you mean. The CCC is quite clear that for the DP to be legitimate, certain conditions must be met, and that’s exactly what Michelle Arnold posted.
Judging from this article written by Archbishop Wilton Daniel Gregory capitol punishment seems to be a complex moral issue that has evolved recently in Church teaching. If you have the time, this article seems very comprehensive on the subject:
Just read it. As Wanderer said, the conditions for a moral DP are still intact. The disagreement may come in whether or not those conditions are actually met.Did you also read the recommended reading that Michelle Arnold listed such as the article written by Jimmy Akin which takes the subject more in-depth?
Recommended reading:
War and Capital Punishment by Jimmy Akin
The morality of it has nothing to do with what crime it is used for, at least not for the purposes of the discussion that I am having. It has to do with whether or not it is the only way to protect society. If there are other ways to protect society, then the death penalty is not moral.
The Church teaching is that it cannot be absolutely prohibited, because in situations where there is no other means for protecting society, then government has a right to execute someone. However, if there are other means to protect society, the death penalty should not be used.There is a strong suggestion in the teaching of the Catholic Church that we shouldn’t need the death penalty but, interestingly, never an absolute prohibition of it (i.e. saying that it’s intrinsically evil as abortion is).
No sorry, the Church does not leave it up to others to decide. The Church has laid out the conditions under which it may be used.The part that’s negotiable is that the Church leaves it up to governments, on a case by case basis, to decide this as in how the state of Maryland could decide whether they needed it or not. And and in this case, they decided to repeal it. This is quite unlike something like say…abortion, which the Church will always condemn as intrinsic evil no matter what a government has to say about it.
No one is saying that it cannot be used anywhere. What we are saying is that in the US and most of the developed world, the conditions that the Church lays out for its use are not met and therefore, it should not be used.I know what it says in the Catechism of the Catholic Church about the death penalty. But it seems like you are selecting the parts you like while ignoring an important other part of what it says. Maybe we don’t need the death penalty in America, and maybe we don’t need it in a lot of other countries as well. But even if we don’t need it in most countries that doesn’t mean that it can never be needed even in today’s world. Not every country has an advanced and capable prison system that can guarantee that a convicted killer won’t escape and start on a killing spree. I’m just saying that people seem to want it to be on the same level of evil with abortion which it is not. When the Church talks about abortion there aren’t any ambiguous statements like “it should be safe but rare” or “as long as you are personally opposed to it you can support it”. The Church just straight up says that abortion is murder. I noticed that people try to do the same thing with war and try to say the Church is always against war when there are times when a war can be a just war.
It’s understandable why there would be some confusion over this since a change was made to the wording of the CCC on this matter without an explanation at the time of why the change was made. But please refer to an article that I posted in #103 and #107 of this thread.
Again, we keep going back to this. The legitimate diversity of opinion on the death penalty is referring to whether or not the conditions for its application are met. There cannot be diversity of opinion on what those conditions are.
I’m sorry but I would NEVER put the word/opinion/judgement of ONE priest, over that of the Holy Father, the CCC, or the Magisterium.
I appreciate that you posted an article, however, for me the definitive source to answer a question on the Catholic faith is the CCC. It contains the teachings of the Church. If it addresses a subject, I do not need to look further. If it does not address it, then other research is necessary. In this case the question is easily and fully addressed by the CCC, so no need to look further.It’s understandable why there would be some confusion over this since a change was made to the wording of the CCC on this matter without an explanation at the time of why the change was made. But please refer to an article that I posted in #103 and #107 of this thread.
I read the articles, and honestly they do not change what is stated in the CCC regardless, so I’m not sure what you’re trying to get at. The conditions of the morality in using the DP are non negotiable Church teaching.CatholicGeek1,
I think we already hammered out our differences in the progression of this thread. Please see the article that I posted in #103 and #107 of this thread. The article pretty much addresses everyone’s questions, comments, and objections and explains why there was a change in the translation or wording of the CCC with regard to the death penalty.
By the way, the writer of the article isn’t the Pope, but he’s an archbishop.
I didn’t think livingwordunity was trying to deny those conditions, I think he just found the article very helpful in explaining them and so is trying to help others by emphasizing that they read it.
I thought we had come to an agreement. I never claimed that the articles contradict the CCC, and I’m not disagreeing with you on this. I think the article by the archbishop gives a helpful insight for why there was a change in the CCC wording in regard to the death penalty.
Gotcha.I thought we had come to an agreement. I never claimed that the articles contradict the CCC, and I’m not disagreeing with you on this. I think the article by the archbishop gives a helpful insight for why there was a change in the CCC wording in regard to the death penalty.
