Capital punishment debate: Dr. Feser and Msgr. Swetland

[Ender]

Certainly, upon reading CCC 2267, one would arrive at that conclusion (given we assume a secure prison).

This is a conclusion based on what is implied, not what is asserted. I will again return to what I see as an insurmountable obstacle for this position: it ignores the primary objective of punishment, and bases the severity of the punishment on what is required to satisfy a secondary objective. Can we accept what is only implied in 2267 if it requires us to ignore what was explicitly stated in 2266?

The difficulty I see when reading the whole of the relevant section of the CCC (let alone the wider writings on CP) is that 2267 is not well harmonised with the remainder of the section. 2266 speaks about punishment more widely than as preventing a proven wrongdoer from repeating crimes*…*

Preventing a particular criminal from committing new offenses has never been the primary objective of punishment. There is more at stake than society’s immediate safety. I’ve cited Pius XII before. Are his words irrelevant now that he is no longer pope? Do a pontiff’s words die with him?*…this retributive function of punishment is concerned not immediately with what is protected by the law but with the very law itself. *(Address to the Sixth Congress of International Penal Law, 1953)

Then 2267 cuts across all of this and argues that regardless of all that - it’s sufficient to securely confine the wrongdoer (prevent him from further crimes).

And this is the problem: having just asserted in 2266 that retribution (retributive justice) is the primary objective of punishment, 2267 simply ignores it as a criterion in determining the severity of the punishment. Nothing could be more harmful to justice.Thus when we cease to consider what the criminal deserves and consider only what will cure him or deter others, we have tacitly removed him from the sphere of justice altogether . . . (C.S.Lewis)

Reading the two sections together would seem to require one of two conclusions:

Either: (1) that life-imprisonment satisfies the above purposes/requirements (no matter the severity of the offence), or alternatively (2) life imprisonment is in some cases a “best efforts” attempt, because to go further, if the individual criminal is now contained, crosses another line.

The problem with these answers is that they both ignore the scriptural basis for the church’s teaching on capital punishment: Gn 9:5-6 where God explicitly commands a life for a life, and then explains why. How is that these passages - cited in 2260 with the observation that “This teaching remains necessary for all time” - may simply be ignored? The expansive interpretation of 2267 requires us to ignore 2260 as well as 2266…not to mention the previous 2000 years of church teaching. Surely there is an interpretation that “harmonizes” better with everything the church teaches.

Ender

 

[IWantGod]

[/INDENT]The problem with these answers is that they both ignore the scriptural basis for the church’s teaching on capital punishment: Gn 9:5-6 where God explicitly commands a life for a life, and then explains why. How is that these passages - cited in 2260 with the observation that “This teaching remains necessary for all time” - may simply be ignored? The expansive interpretation of 2267 requires us to ignore 2260 as well as 2266…not to mention the previous 2000 years of church teaching. Surely there is an interpretation that “harmonizes” better with everything the church teaches.

Ender

I guess the question is, does it really serve temporal justice to kill as a form of punishment.?

Can killing ever be a justified form of punishment beyond satisfying our emotions. Jesus also said, he with out sin cast the first stone.

 

[Ender]

I guess the question is, does it really serve temporal justice to kill as a form of punishment?

We used to think so, but that was when we appreciated the heinousness of murder.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.(1) 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. (1) Gn 9:5-6 *(Catechism of Trent)
Although we tend to oppose murder now on the basis that it contributes to a culture of death it is reasonable to wonder if we don’t in fact have it backwards.*Is it possible for punishment to signify the gravity of crimes which deserve death if their perpetrators are never visited with execution? *(J. Budziszewski)

Can killing ever be a justified form of punishment beyond satisfying our emotions. Jesus also said, he with out sin cast the first stone.

If you hold that executions are never justified you condemn 2000 years of church teaching, the actions of dozens of popes, the beliefs of virtually all the Fathers and Doctors of the Church (who addressed the subject), and the word of God himself.

As for the example of the woman caught in adultery you could just as easily make the argument that, as the woman received no punishment at all, not just capital punishment but all punishment should be banned. The church does not refer to this incident in her teaching, nor to the example of Cain.

Ender

 

[Ender]

Although we tend to oppose murder now on the basis that it contributes to a culture of death it is reasonable to wonder if we don’t in fact have it backwards.

This probably would have made some sense had I written “Although we tend to oppose capital punishment…” which is what I meant to say.

Ender

 

[e_c]

I guess the question is, does it really serve temporal justice to kill as a form of punishment.?

Can killing ever be a justified form of punishment beyond satisfying our emotions. Jesus also said, he with out sin cast the first stone.

Yes, and it is a proportional punishment for certain heinous crimes. And does retributive justice not demand a proportional punishment?

This life is not the greatest good. And plenty of people on death row have conversions because of the fact t hey are on death row. And there is the aspect of deterrence… What motivation does a bank robber have for not killing a hostage if there is not the threat of the death penalty? The goodness in his heart?

I’ve begun reading Dr. Feser’s book. I can tell you, it is thorough.

The woman caught in adultery was likely being brought to Jesus by the clients who frequented her, which is how she was caught in the first place. They knew, beginning with the eldest, that this would mean they would have to stone themselves - once self-interest entered in, zeal for the law dissipated. This form of punishment for that offense was also a dead letter at that point - it was purely a test of Jesus’ nominal fidelity to Moses.

 

[Rau]

This is a conclusion based on what is implied [by 2267], not what is asserted.

2267 says: *“If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.” * Is it you view that the Church could hold that CP (in the circumstances described) is moral, and yet instruct/B] - not encourage, appeal or exhort - but instruct authority not to use it (and for the reasons given)?

 

[Rau]

…The problem with these answers is that they both ignore the scriptural basis for the church’s teaching on capital punishment: Gn 9:5-6 where **God explicitly **commands ****a life for a life, and then explains why. How is that these passages - cited in 2260 with the observation that “This teaching remains necessary for all time” - may simply be ignored?

Feser would appear to read this in the same way. Were there no more to the question than we read here, it is difficult to see how there really could be any debate within the Church about the wisdom (let alone the morality) of CP.

So what considerations are missing that would allow multiple Pope’s to argue there is **no compulsion **to apply CP, and in fact that in relatively readily achieved circumstances, authority **must not **apply it?

 

[Ender]

2267 says: *“If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.” * Is it your view that the Church could hold that CP (in the circumstances described) is moral, and yet instruct/B] - not encourage, appeal or exhort - but instruct authority not to use it (and for the reasons given)?
More than a decade ago, whenever the “Faithful Citizenship” document first came out, I remember pointing out that whatever position one chose to take on any issue or candidate it was possible to find a supporting statement in the document. It was all things to all people, so what happened was that people would latch on to a statement that supported their position and simply ignore other sections that contradicted it. There was no attempt to find a coherent position that satisfied all of its recommendations. I see the same thing happening with capital punishment.

If you assume that capital punishment is immoral except when it is judged necessary for the physical protection of the public then you have to ignore pretty much everything the church taught in the past on this subject as well as what she teaches today. If, however, you assume that the comments in 2267 are prudential recommendations then there is no problem as there is no contradiction with existing doctrines.

Ender

 

[Ender]

Feser would appear to read this in the same way. Were there no more to the question than we read here, it is difficult to see how there really could be any debate within the Church about the wisdom (let alone the morality) of CP.

So what considerations are missing that would allow multiple Pope’s to argue there is **no compulsion **to apply CP, and in fact that in relatively readily achieved circumstances, authority **must not **apply it?

Opposition to the use of capital punishment is not new; it goes back to the Fathers. Earlier popes spoke out against its use. The difference then was there was no confusion about opposing its use as unwise and opposing it as immoral. As I said, if it is judged (now) to be immoral it raises issues that can only be resolved by…ignoring them. Genesis 9:5-6 is the perfect example. There is no way to morally oppose capital punishment without either dismissing that passage as irrelevant, or reinterpreting it to mean something other than what it obviously says.

Ender

 

[Rau]

Opposition to the use of capital punishment is not new; it goes back to the Fathers. Earlier popes spoke out against its use. The difference then was there was no confusion about opposing its use as unwise and opposing it as immoral. As I said, if it is judged (now) to be immoral it raises issues that can only be resolved by…ignoring them. Genesis 9:5-6 is the perfect example. There is no way to morally oppose capital punishment without either dismissing that passage as irrelevant, or reinterpreting it to mean something other than what it obviously says.

Ender

The passage appears to go beyond authorizing CP. It in fact appears to demand that CP be used.

 

[Rau]

More than a decade ago, whenever the “Faithful Citizenship” document first came out, I remember pointing out that whatever position one chose to take on any issue or candidate it was possible to find a supporting statement in the document. It was all things to all people, so what happened was that people would latch on to a statement that supported their position and simply ignore other sections that contradicted it. There was no attempt to find a coherent position that satisfied all of its recommendations. I see the same thing happening with capital punishment.

If you assume that capital punishment is immoral except when it is judged necessary for the physical protection of the public then you have to ignore pretty much everything the church taught in the past on this subject as well as what she teaches today. If, however, you assume that the comments in 2267 are prudential recommendations then there is no problem as there is no contradiction with existing doctrines.

Ender

You ducked my question. I believe your answer to my question must be “yes”. While I agree a prudential position comes closest to harmonizing all the material on CP, the language in the CCC fails by any reasonable standard to achieve that objective.

 

[Ender]

The passage appears to go beyond authorizing CP. It in fact appears to demand that CP be used.

Yes, I agree. That is, it should be the presumptive punishment absent mitigating circumstances, and I think this is how it used to be understood.
*For God says, “Whosoever shall shed man’s blood, his blood shall be shed.” These words cannot utter a prophecy, since a prophecy of this sort would often be false, but a decree and a precept. (Bellarmine) *
Ender

 

[Ender]

You ducked my question. I believe your answer to my question must be “yes”. While I agree a prudential position comes closest to harmonizing all the material on CP, the language in the CCC fails by any reasonable standard to achieve that objective.

Well, it’s pretty clear that the teaching on capital punishment is anything but…clear.*Catholic teaching on capital punishment is in a state of dangerous ambiguity. The discussion of the death penalty in the Catechism of the Catholic Church is so difficult to interpret that conscientious members of the faithful scarcely know what their Church obliges them to believe. Although the constant teaching of the Church has been that the state has a right to impose the death penalty, the Catechism declares that the actual circumstances in which capital punishment is legitimate are “practically nonexistent.” Moreover, the Catechism weaves doctrine so tightly together with prudential and factual judgments that it is not at all clear how much of its discourse on capital punishment actually is being put forward as binding Catholic teaching. *(R. Michael Dunnigan, J.D., J.C.L.)

*The realm of human affairs is a messy one, full of at least apparent inconsistency and incoherence, and the recent teaching of the Catholic Church on capital punishment—vitiated, as I intend to show, by errors of historical fact and interpretation—is no exception. *(Kevin L. Flannery, S.J. Gregorian Univ.)

“There’s a very important nuance here that Catholics need to understand,” …“which is that the Church’s tradition and its magisterial teaching, which is unchanged by Pope Saint John Paul II, Benedict, and Francis, is that states and governments have the right to inflict the penalty of death when guilt is absolutely known and when the gravity of the crime rises to the death penalty.”*

The judgment is ultimately a prudential one…* and this is clear even when John Paul II said in Evangelium Vitae that the need for capital punishment to protect society from offenders is “very rare, if not practically non-existent.” **(Fr. Thomas Petri O.P., Dean - Dominican House of Studies D.C.)I share the position that 2267 and EV express prudential judgments.

Ender

 

[Rau]

…I share the position that 2267 and EV express prudential judgments.

How can a position, judged as a prudential judgement by the Pope who makes it (as you assert) then be used as a basis to “instruct” civil authority? There seems to be no end to the inconsistencies.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

“There’s a very important nuance here that Catholics need to understand,” …“which is that the Church’s tradition and its magisterial teaching, which is unchanged by Pope Saint John Paul II, Benedict, and Francis, is that states and governments have the right to inflict the penalty of death when guilt is absolutely known and when the gravity of the crime rises to the death penalty.”**
Obviously, just as individuals have a “right to lethal self defence.” So what?
That still doesnt help us decide or recognise what types of situations actually validate this right.The description above is still somewhat incomplete so we cannot yet know for sure.
Unlike in times past there is a new situation…the possibility of true life imprisionment as an option.

Recent Popes have decided this practical development is significant enough to affect the above moral norm/right which always assumed such was never possible or reasonably true.
Now, in 1st world countries it is.

Bingo, we are getting the birth of a better articulated moral norm/right. Yay.
Now we must add “bloodless means not available” to the old norm/right.
The Magisterium does have the authority to better precision moral norms does it not?

The judgment is ultimately a prudential one…

 

[Rau]

Blue - how do you reconcile 2260 with the trend to abandon CP?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Blue - how do you reconcile 2260 with the trend to abandon CP?

I’ve never really focused on 2260 in this connection.
At first glance its pro life rather than pro retribution.

The phrase “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed;” seems capable of being interpreted to say the very opposite of what Jesus would have said if you wanted to look at it without any reference to the NT.
As in what Jesus said, " whoever lives by the sword shall die by the sword."
That doesn’t sound at all like unmitigated approval or a command for the State to punish criminals to the full extent of eye for eye always and everywhere if desired

To me it seems a warning to anyone who feels they have authority over others - the power of life and death fully belongs to God alone, certainly not to individuals and only very cautiously and in limited fashion to the state…and even then as a necessary evil in a fallen world.

What about you.

 

[Ender]

How can a position, judged as a prudential judgement by the Pope who makes it (as you assert) then be used as a basis to “instruct” civil authority? There seems to be no end to the inconsistencies.

How can the words of a pope be interpreted to contradict the word of God? The inconsistencies abound, but are fewest if the words are understood as prudential.*It is manifestly impossible for Catholic doctrine on the death penalty to “develop” from an approbation based on revealed truth to a condemnation based on the teaching of the last Pope. *(Christopher Ferrara)
*
Given that both of these contradictory interpretations have appeared in the same respected journal (The Thomist), it is evident that the state of Catholic teaching on the question of the death penalty is unclear even to honest professionals. *(Andrew Olson, The Conundrum of Capital Punishment)
*In coming to this prudential conclusion, the magisterium is not changing the doctrine of the Church. *(Cardinal Dulles)

*The judgment is ultimately a prudential one, he continued, and this is clear even when John Paul II said in Evangelium Vitae that the need for capital punishment to protect society from offenders is “very rare, if not practically non-existent.” *(Fr. Thomas Petri)

*Parenthetically, in the ambiguities of the exhortation on conscience, we may be paying a price for the problematic way that a prudential opinion against capital punishment was edited into the Catechism. *(Fr. George Rutler)

*The most reasonable explanation for the current pope’s stance on this question is that his opposition is an exercise in *prudence…**(Dennis Teti, Hillsdale College)

*It is, I think, unfortunate that this prudential judgement was added to the Catechism. *(Dr. Jeff Mirus)
Ender

 

[Ender]

Unlike in times past there is a new situation…the possibility of true life imprisonment as an option.

This has been asserted but I have seen nothing at all to support the claim, which on its face seems contradicted by history. The Romans enslaved tens of thousands for life; the Turks captured thousands of Christians and condemned them to row in their galleys. Even the church recognized the possibility of life imprisonment as far back as the 16th century. There is nothing new here.*…but if he has fallen several times into the same fault, he is to be condemned to permanent imprisonment or to the galleys *(Fifth Lateran Council, 1512)

What “judgement” exactly is “prudential”?

Well, the capabilities of modern penal systems for a start. *if we are not discussing the immorality of capital punishment in itself, when all is said and done it is not a question of “development” of doctrine, but only the debatable application of a morally legitimate penalty. *(Christopher Ferrara)
Ender

 

[Ender]

The phrase “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed;” seems capable of being interpreted to say the very opposite of what Jesus would have said if you wanted to look at it without any reference to the NT.

It is a mistake to pit the OT against the NT, as if the latter corrected the errors of the former. *And these books of the Old and New Testament are to be received as sacred and canonical, in their integrity, with all their parts…because, having been written by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God for their author, and have been delivered as such to the Church herself. (First Vatican Council)
Nowhere does Jesus condemn punishment in general or capital punishment in particular. He uses any number of parables where an authority kills the unrighteous, and himself said: “How well you have set aside the commandment of God in order to uphold your tradition! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ *(Mk 7:9-10)

As in what Jesus said, " whoever lives by the sword shall die by the sword."
That doesn’t sound at all like unmitigated approval or a command for the State to punish criminals to the full extent of eye for eye always and everywhere if desired

No one has suggested that “always and everywhere” is the standard. We all (conspicuously including the church) recognize exceptions. Today, however, the exception and the standard have been reversed.*And as for “All that take the sword shall perish with the sword,” these words cannot be rightly understood except in this sense: Every one who commits an unjust murder ought in turn to be condemned to death by the magistrate. For Our Lord rebuked Peter not because a just defense is unlawful, but because he wished not so much to defend himself or Our Lord, as to avenge the injury done to Our Lord, although he himself had no official authority… *(Bellarmine)

To me it seems a warning to anyone who feels they have authority over others - the power of life and death fully belongs to God alone…

*And thus that which is lawful to God is lawful for His ministers when they act by His mandate. It is evident that God who is the Author of laws, has every right to inflict death on account of sin. For “the wages of sin is death.” Neither does His minister sin in inflicting that punishment. The sense, therefore, of “Thou shalt not kill” is that one shall not kill by one’s own authority. *(Catechism of St. Thomas)

… certainly not to individuals and only very cautiously and in limited fashion to the state…and even then as a necessary evil in a fallen world.

It is not a necessary evil. It is a fundamental necessity.*So fundamental is the duty of public authority to requite good and evil in deeds that natural law philosophers consider it the paramount function of the state, and the New Testament declares that the role is delegated to magistrates by God Himself. *(J. Budziszewski)
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