Capital punishment is justified

  • Thread starter Thread starter cardinalsrule
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
you project on God, your “sentimentalist” and Western conception of love.
No, you project on God your human traits, and so you have become confused. Your emotions change. God’s love for his creation does not.
 
Last edited:
There are situations where the damned could be better (like non existence), but it would not be right.
That’s false, as that would imply that non-existence is good, which is not possible since God is goodness itself and God gives good. I reject your interpretation.
 
Last edited:
The Non-existence is less bad for the damned! the purpose of God is not what is better for man, but what is better for the extrinsic glory of his son.
 
The Non-existence is less bad for the damned!
Compared to the suffering of hell because if you don’t exist you won’t suffer. But this is not a metaphysical statement of what is good. Existence is good. One cannot say that non-existence is good. That is false.
 
the purpose of God is not what is better for man, but what is better for the extrinsic glory of his son.
Jesus Christ is God. Jesus Christ wants to save everyone. Jesus Christ loves all sinners. If you reject that you are not accepting the teachings of the Catholic church.
 
Last edited:
I did not say that non- existence is good, I said it is less bad (for the damned)
To say that it is less bad is to imply that it is truly better than their existence and thus a kind of good. You cannot have it both ways.

What you can say is that you would rather not exist than suffer hell, which is a subjective statement.
 
Jésus Christ est Dieu. Jésus-Christ veut sauver tout le monde
it is false Jesus does not want to save everyone absolutely, otherwise we would all be in Heaven, because everything that God absolutely wants is realized.
He wants to save us in a hypothetical way, that is to say in a way that will conform to his extrinsic glory. That’s why he will not save everyone.
 
Out of curiosity, apparently some here, including you, know which topics have been outlawed by the moderators. Where do you get this info? Is there a list?
I don’t think there’s a list. I seem to recall somebody raising this once before and asking for a list.

I was aware of it because (a) I spend way too much time on here and (b) I have an interest in capital punishment topic so I was posting in a bunch of the threads about the Pope changing the death penalty section of CCC, before the mods put the hammer down and locked them all.
 
What you can say is that you would rather not exist than suffer hell, which is a subjective statement.
It is objective from the point of view of the damned. Non-existence is evil according to the order of God, but it would be good for the damned
 
Jesus Christ has offered us a means to salvation. He has offered it to every unworthy sinner! Therefore he wants to save everyone. It goes without saying that if you do not commit to God’s will, then he cannot save you.
 
Last edited:
Jesus Christ has offered us a means to salvation. He has offered it to every unworthy sinner! It goes without saying that if you do not commit to God’s will, then he cannot save you.
Jesus can save infallibly, yes infallibly, whoever he wants, without having to force him, or without having to destroy his free will.
 
@Mboo and @IWantGod

You guys are totally off-topic. Why don’t you discuss this in PM’s?
 
The legitimacy of capital punishment has been upheld in the Bible, all the Church Fathers, the Doctors of the Church (including St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas) and the Council of Trent. It forms part of Catholic Dogma we are required to accept. Furthermore the Waldensian Heretics, who opposed war and the death penalty, after their uprising was defeated, were required to take an oath stating inter alia that-

“Concerning secular power we declare that without mortal sin it is possible to exercise a judgment of blood as long as one proceeds to bring punishment not in hatred but in judgment, not incautiously but advisedly” (Denzinger 425)

That is not to say that the state, having the right to impose the death penalty, should always make use of it. There are prudential arguments as to why the use of the death penalty should not be used today, which Catholics will likely continue to debate forever.

Pope Francis is within his rights (as did Pope St Nicholas, Pope St John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI before him) to teach prudentially that the circumstances that would justify use of the death penalty are not present in our society (which is where the term “inadmissible” comes from). But he can never teach that it is intrinsically evil and inherently wrong, or that the state has no right to use it under any circumstances, as that would contradict 2000 years of Church teaching.

Furthermore as for it being licit to disagree with the Holy Father on this, Pope Benedict XVI (when he was still Prefect of the CDF) stated that -
“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia”.

For a more in depth view of this issue I would strongly recommend the comments of Father Thomas Petri OP, who gave an excellent summation on this issue on EWTN.
 
Last edited:
I would strongly recommend the comments of Father Thomas Petri OP, who gave an excellent summation on this issue on EWTN.
You’re referring to this video, I’m sure.
the circumstances that would justify use of the death penalty are not present in our society (which is where the term “inadmissible” comes from). But he can never teach that it is intrinsically evil and inherently wrong, as that would contradict 2000 years of Church teaching.
What do you mean by “our society”? One problem is that whatever’s in the Catechism applies globally across all countries and cultures.

Second, what do you mean by “the circumstances that would justify use of the death penalty”? One reason that’s been provided for declaring the death penalty “inadmissible” is that we now have “better detention systems”. Obviously this is a very practical circumstance. But Pope Francis has on other occasions spoken of “the new demands of conscience”. (Apparently our forefathers’ conscience was of an inferior quality.) Do we consider these new demands of conscience a change in circumstances too? By saying that in the 21st century conscience demands that we outlaw the death penalty, he is in fact very close to declaring it intrinsically evil, for conscientious objections are hardly about practical circumstances. As you said, this would go against 2,000 years of prior teaching.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top