Capital Punishment

[Rau]

Seems quite apposite in how CP is to be approached.
It also leads into Jesus’s counsel that whoever hates another has already killed them in his heart.

Or should I say murdered them in their heart .

If hate is present as a motivator, the act is clearly immoral. I don’t know why you’d raise that tangent.

 

[Ender]

1. The death penalty in no way deters a potential murderer from committing the crime.

This is often asserted, but there is little reason to believe it is true. All punishments deter, and one would hardly expect the severest punishment of all to be the only one that did not.

1. The death penalty is administered by imperfect humans overseeing an imperfect judicial system that has made errors in the past and will do so in the future. We have released many prisoners from death row after DNA evidence comes to light proving their innocence. Unfortunately in some cases this evidence has become known too late to save an innocent person from being killed by the state.

Again, this is often asserted, but the facts appear to be very different than the perception. Yes, a number of people on death row have been exonerated or released for other reasons, but it has not in fact been shown that any who have been executed have actually been innocent, and the number for which a reasonable case for their innocence can be made is in the single digits.

Ender

 

[Ender]

Protection, not punishment, is the valid end of banishment, imprisonment or execution. The intention of punishment is not protection in se but medicinal, that is, to change or end the behavior(s) of the evil doer.

No, protection is only one of the secondary ends of punishment. It is not the primary end.

Do you have an encyclical or apostolic father’s writing to reference support for the claim that protection of the community is not the primary intention of execution?

You want me to prove a negative? It is claimed that the traditional teaching of the church is that capital punishment is allowed “when this is the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor.” Can you show a single document in the entire history of the church (before 1995) that asserts this?

We know from the current catechism that “The primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.” It cannot be seriously argued that protecting against future disorders does anything at all to redress disorders (crimes) that have already been committed, so even if we can’t agree on what the primary objective is, we can at least say what it is not - and that would be protection.

A death foreseen as an effect does not mean automatically that the death is intended.

That’s true, but in an execution the death is very much intended.

What crimes justly merit the death penalty? What is the rationale that supports that those crimes and only those crimes justly deserve death?

Whatever other crimes merit that penalty, we can say for certain that it is the just penalty for murder.

I do not believe we are capable of God’s justice as we lack the wheel base.

I don’t know what you mean here, but surely simply because we cannot be as just as God cannot mean that we should not act as justly as we know how. Any discussion of punishment that does not include a concern for justice is invalid.

No one has claimed the state may kill preemptively (before the crime) but only remedially. See Romans 13:4.

Executing a person because it is believed he represents a future threat is killing preemptively, and this is precisely what is being argued for. What you call killing in self defense is in fact a preemptive action. Nor does Romans 13:4 support your contention. That is in fact one of the passages the church has cited in explaining its recognition of the validity of capital punishment.

Ender

 

[flower_lady]

I get your point…(I think) although we did see this to a degree with the previous administration on abortion when it was clear from Obama…and Clinton down…that they had pretty strident opposing views against what the Catholic church in particular teaches…I think that the Democrat party is a decidedly pro-choice party…in regards to capital government…unfortunately even with the last 3 Popes opposition to it…it just doesn’t generate the same type of emotion here in the US as is the case with abortion

Amen to that!

 

[flower_lady]

I will make what I have to say very simple, and many of you may think that I am simple. When Jesus said to the people who were about to stone the prostitute, and replied; He who has not sinned cast the first stone should have been enough to abolish capital punishment at the very moment that He said that. It is one of the ten commandments. It does not say; Thou shalt not kill unless the government say’s that you can. Capital punishment is non other than premeditated murder. It is thought out, planned and executed. If I had been alive at the time Jesus saved the prostitute I most certainly don’t see how I would be able to even pick up a stone, leave alone throw one. God is merciful and forgiving, to bad some of us aren’t. Thank you for your opinions and I pray that some of you will learn to treat your neighbor(not just the good ones) as you would want to be treated if you were in their shoes. Only God knows these murderers hearts and I know that if you could go back and read a lot of these peoples backgrounds and find out what many of them have gone through; You might just change your minds. (That is about capital punishment).God bless you all!

 

[o_mlly]

No, protection is only one of the secondary ends of punishment. It is not the primary end.
You want me to prove a negative?

To offer a citation in support of one’s claim is not to prove a negative but to give authority to the claim. Do you have a citation? If not then the claim is merely your opinion.

It is claimed that the traditional teaching of the church is that capital punishment is allowed “when this is the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor.” Can you show a single document in the entire history of the church (before 1995) that asserts this?

”It is claimed …?” Show us who claims that the traditional teaching of the church says anything about when or how the death penalty is or is not applicable.
The Magisterium is guided and bound by Tradition but in its absence must continue to teach. Or are you inferring that if there is no traditional teaching on novel technology, such as on in vitro fertilization, that the Church ought not to teach on anything regarding its morality? If the technology of the state’s ability to incarcerate changes then the Church teaches not from tradition but from her first principles – Thou shalt not kill.

The primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense. It cannot be seriously argued that protecting against future disorders does anything at all to redress disorders (crimes) that have already been committed, so even if we can’t agree on what the primary objective is, we can at least say what it is not - and that would be protection.

Redressing essentially the disorder of a theft or a lie is within the community’s power. Redressing the death of a member is not. What disorder does the execution of the alleged perpetrator redress?

That’s true, but in an execution the death is very much intended.

In a state execution, death is no more intended than the death of an unjust aggressor in an act of self-defense or an enemy combatant in a just war.

Whatever other crimes merit that penalty, we can say for certain that it is the just penalty for murder.

Really?
As time passed, the Church’s Tradition has always consistently taught the absolute and unchanging value of the commandment “You shall not kill”. It is a known fact that in the first centuries, murder was put among the three most serious sins-along with apostasy and adultery-and required a particularly heavy and lengthy public penance before the repentant murderer could be granted forgiveness and readmission to the ecclesial community. EVANGELIUM VITAE

I don’t know what you mean here, but surely simply because we cannot be as just as God cannot mean that we should not act as justly as we know how. Any discussion of punishment that does not include a concern for justice is invalid.

Any discussion of justice that does not admit our inability to reach the ideal is foolishness. The truth is we are not omniscient. Is “beyond a reasonable doubt” as good as “moral certainty”? Do we admit of this gap in our knowledge and dismiss our ignorance as not really crucial to effecting the justice we seek when we take another’s life?

Executing a person because it is believed he represents a future threat is killing preemptively, and this is precisely what is being argued for. What you call killing in self defense is in fact a preemptive action. Nor does Romans 13:4 support your contention. That is in fact one of the passages the church has cited in explaining its recognition of the validity of capital punishment. Ender

Killing in self-defense is not preemptive in the moment. How long does that “moment” sustain?
You have offered nothing to support your contentions that there is any traditional teaching that prescribes conditions allowing or not allowing the death penalty, or that protection is a secondary and not primary end of the death penalty. Your personal positions on these issues are not supported by church teaching. If you still believe your positions are supported, cite the documents.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

To assist in understanding the meaning of the 5th commandment (references are to CCC):

First and foremost 2258 expresses an absolute requirement of the commandment: “no one can under any circumstance claim for himself the right directly to destroy an innocent human being”. [Sourced from Donum Vitae].

In 2261 the CCC tells us that “Scripture specifies the prohibition contained in the 5th commandment as: ‘Do not slay the innocent and the righteous’”.

Yes, directly killing the the innocent is always wrong.
“Slaying”, like “murder” is a form of direct killing.

There seems to be no absolute prohibition on indirect killing of either the guilty or the innocent. However cases justifying the latter are far fewer.

And while there is no command that prohibits all indirect killing of innocents there seems to be a counsel that we should not…and rather prefer to die ourselves.

Just as it’s a better thing to remain a virgin than marry, and to give our possessions away than to administer wealth justly.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

That’a an opinion I guess? BTW, the PODE is often mis-expressed, and is not a necessary tool for determining morality.

Is the 3font model of Aquinas any more bullet proof a tool when applied in concrete cases of indirection?
All systems by definition have some weaknesses in the face of a near infinite procession of varied concrete cases.

Indirect intentions and mixed good/evil scenarios are always notoriously hard to analyse with a consistent application of a single set of principles.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

If hate is present as a motivator, the act is clearly immoral. I don’t know why you’d raise that tangent.

I would think that the actual emotion and intention that Ender names as capital punishment is so vindictive and close to mild cold hate as to be indistinguishable .

All for their own good of course.

 

[flower_lady]

To offer a citation in support of one’s claim is not to prove a negative but to give authority to the claim. Do you have a citation? If not then the claim is merely your opinion.
”It is claimed …?” Show us who claims that the traditional teaching of the church says anything about when or how the death penalty is or is not applicable.
The Magisterium is guided and bound by Tradition but in its absence must continue to teach. Or are you inferring that if there is no traditional teaching on novel technology, such as on in vitro fertilization, that the Church ought not to teach on anything regarding its morality? If the technology of the state’s ability to incarcerate changes then the Church teaches not from tradition but from her first principles – Thou shalt not kill.
Redressing essentially the disorder of a theft or a lie is within the community’s power. Redressing the death of a member is not. What disorder does the execution of the alleged perpetrator redress?
In a state execution, death is no more intended than the death of an unjust aggressor in an act of self-defense or an enemy combatant in a just war.
Really?
As time passed, the Church’s Tradition has always consistently taught the absolute and unchanging value of the commandment “You shall not kill”. It is a known fact that in the first centuries, murder was put among the three most serious sins-along with apostasy and adultery-and required a particularly heavy and lengthy public penance before the repentant murderer could be granted forgiveness and readmission to the ecclesial community. EVANGELIUM VITAE

Any discussion of justice that does not admit our inability to reach the ideal is foolishness. The truth is we are not omniscient. Is “beyond a reasonable doubt” as good as “moral certainty”? Do we admit of this gap in our knowledge and dismiss our ignorance as not really crucial to effecting the justice we seek when we take another’s life?
Killing in self-defense is not preemptive in the moment. How long does that “moment” sustain?
You have offered nothing to support your contentions that there is any traditional teaching that prescribes conditions allowing or not allowing the death penalty, or that protection is a secondary and not primary end of the death penalty. Your personal positions on these issues are not supported by church teaching. If you still believe your positions are supported, cite the documents.

That was only my opinion of capital punishment only. Not self defense or war. quite naturally there are exceptions. Maybe I gave the wrong impression. I think murderers should be punished and put in prison if it is unjust murder, or malicious murder, but not killed for it.

 

[Rau]

I will make what I have to say very simple, and many of you may think that I am simple. When Jesus said to the people who were about to stone the prostitute, and replied; He who has not sinned cast the first stone should have been enough to abolish capital punishment at the very moment that He said that. It is one of the ten commandments. It does not say; Thou shalt not kill unless the government say’s that you can. Capital punishment is non other than premeditated murder. It is thought out, planned and executed. If I had been alive at the time Jesus saved the prostitute I most certainly don’t see how I would be able to even pick up a stone, leave alone throw one. God is merciful and forgiving, to bad some of us aren’t. Thank you for your opinions and I pray that some of you will learn to treat your neighbor(not just the good ones) as you would want to be treated if you were in their shoes. Only God knows these murderers hearts and I know that if you could go back and read a lot of these peoples backgrounds and find out what many of them have gone through; You might just change your minds. (That is about capital punishment).God bless you all!

I presume the people taking the administration of justice into their own hands rendered their prospective act not capital punishment, but rather vigilantism.

The Church today acknowledges that CP is not intrinsically evil. There can be a time and s place for it. Cardinal Dulles:
firstthings.com/article/2001/04/catholicism-amp-capital-punishment

 

[Ender]

To offer a citation in support of one’s claim is not to prove a negative but to give authority to the claim. Do you have a citation? If not then the claim is merely your opinion.

OK, fair enough. I’ll provide citations for all of my assertions. Punishment has four ends:*The purposes of criminal punishment are rather unanimously delineated in the Catholic tradition. Punishment is held to have a variety of ends that may conveniently be reduced to the following four: rehabilitation, defense against the criminal, deterrence, and retribution. *(Cardinal Dulles)
The primary end is redress. *The primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense. *(CCC 2266)
The question is, which of the four ends does “redress” refer to? According to the USCCB it is retribution.
*The third justifying purpose for punishment is retribution or the restoration of the order of justice which has been violated by the action of the criminal. *(USCCB 1980)
The USCCB listed the purposes of punishment but did not order them.

”It is claimed …?” Show us who claims that the traditional teaching of the church says anything about when or how the death penalty is or is not applicable.

*2266 The traditional teaching of the Church has acknowledged as well-founded the right and duty of legitimate public authority to punish malefactors by means of penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime not excluding, in cases of extreme gravity, the death penalty. *(Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1992)

*2267 The traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude, presupposing full ascertainment of the identity and responsibility of the offender, recourse to the death penalty, when this is the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor. *(Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1997)

If the technology of the state’s ability to incarcerate changes then the Church teaches not from tradition but from her first principles – Thou shalt not kill.

The church has never interpreted that commandment to mean that all killing is disallowed. She has always taught that there are three exceptions.*“It is lawful to kill when fighting in a just war; when carrying out by order of the Supreme Authority a sentence of death in punishment of a crime; and, finally, in cases of necessary and lawful defense of one’s own life against an unjust aggressor.” *(Catechism of Pius X, 1905)Ender

 

[Ender]

Redressing essentially the disorder of a theft or a lie is within the community’s power. Redressing the death of a member is not. What disorder does the execution of the alleged perpetrator redress?

Don’t confuse redress with restitution. What is redressed is “the order of justice which has been violated by the action of the criminal.” (USCCB) That is, it is justice itself that is restored.
*God’s fatherly love does not rule out punishment, even if the latter must always be understood as part of a merciful **justice **that re-establishes the violated order for the sake of man’s own good… *(JPII, General Audience, 1999)

In a state execution, death is no more intended than the death of an unjust aggressor in an act of self-defense or an enemy combatant in a just war.

It is hard to imagine a more intended death than from an execution, where the entire object of all the people involved is to bring about the death of the condemned. As I asked someone else, what distinguishes a mob execution from a State execution as far as intent is concerned?

Really? [Death is a just penalty for murder]

It is a historical fact that the church for nearly 2000 years has recognized the right of a State to employ capital punishment for murder. Either death is a just punishment for that crime or the church has been unjust throughout her entire existence.

Any discussion of justice that does not admit our inability to reach the ideal is foolishness. The truth is we are not omniscient.

That we cannot be perfect is not an excuse to do less than we think is right simply because we cannot ever act with certainty.

Killing in self-defense is not preemptive in the moment. How long does that “moment” sustain?

Killing in self defense is a reaction to an immediate threat. Killing in an execution is not. There is no immediate threat. There is a presumed future threat. The situations are vastly different.

Ender

 

[Ender]

I would think that the actual emotion and intention that Ender names as capital punishment is so vindictive and close to mild cold hate as to be indistinguishable.

All for their own good of course.

Don’t ascribe opinions to me that I have never expressed. Nothing whatever in anything I have ever said about capital punishment supports this. It is a complete fabrication and misunderstanding of everything I have said on the subject. You have enough to do with describing your own position. Don’t for a moment believe you can describe mine.

Ender

 

[Ender]

I presume the people taking the administration of justice into their own hands rendered their prospective act not capital punishment, but rather vigilantism.

The State has not just the right but the obligation to punish the wicked, a right that extends to the use of capital punishment, something completely forbidden to the individual.*Augustine says (De Civ. Dei i) [Can. Quicumque percutit, caus. xxiii, qu. 8: ‘A man who, without exercising public authority, kills an evil-doer, shall be judged guilty of murder, and all the more, since he has dared to usurp a power which God has not given him.’ *(Aquinas ST II-II 64,3)
Ender

 

[esieffe]

Several popes have called for the abolition of capital punishment but i am done arguing about that.

They should just put in the catachism.

Dont reply.
PM if you have a question.

I am just going to make a boiler plate for this one night so I don’t have to keep re-writing it.
tonight it’s just going to have to the cliff note version.
-too expensive
-too many people are exonerated on death row, what about the people who were not so lucky?
-we are called to convert souls not kill them.
-many victims are against legislative revenge in their name.

 

[Don_Ruggero]

That’s true, but in an execution the death is very much intended.
Whatever other crimes merit that penalty, we can say for certain that it is the just penalty for murder.

The Church’s Shepherds have said otherwise…and it is to them that docility and submission is owed.

 

[Don_Ruggero]

Show us who claims that the traditional teaching of the church says anything about when or how the death penalty is or is not applicable.

Fortunately, we have a living Magisterium, which is concerned with not only Faith but Morals.

As Pope Saint John Paul II, in writing about the excommunications connected with the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X in 1988
4. The root of this schismatic act can be discerned in an incomplete and contradictory notion of Tradition. Incomplete, because it does not take sufficiently into account the living character of Tradition, which, as the Second Vatican Council clearly taught, "comes from the apostles and progresses in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit. There is a growth in insight into the realities and words that are being passed on. This comes about in various ways.
Having taught on issues touching upon the death penalty in courses of applied moral theology for over three decades now, it is truly wonderful to see exactly what the Saint of God wrote of…“the help of the Holy Spirit” to the College of Bishops and “the growth in insight” which I have been witness to in these years since the writing and promulgation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and, most especially, Evangelium Vitae.

You will find helpful material which articulates why the death penalty has been determined, to use the recent expression of Pope Francis, to be morally inadmissible on the site of the USCCB under the banner

The Church’s Anti-Death Penalty Position

usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/death-penalty-capital-punishment/catholic-campaign-to-end-the-use-of-the-death-penalty.cfm

Two declarations that deserve to be quoted here:
The new evangelization calls for followers of Christ who are unconditionally pro-life: who will proclaim, celebrate and serve the Gospel of life in every situation. A sign of hope is the increasing recognition that the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil. . . . I renew the appeal I made . . . for a consensus to end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.
—Pope John Paul II Papal Mass, St. Louis, Missouri, January 27, 1999
and
*No matter how heinous the crime, if society can protect itself without ending a human life, it should do so.
—USCCB, A Culture of Life and the Penalty of Death
*
Finally, there have been pull quotes used in this thread which have not presented the mind of those who are being quoted, most notably His Eminence Avery Cardinal Dulles. That is intellectual dishonesty at its worst.

Therefore, to clarify both the thoughts of Cardinal Dulles as well as the role of the Magisterium on precisely this issue, Archbishop Wilton Gregory who was president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, declared in a 5,000+ word address on this topic
Avery Dulles finds no rupture in the development of Catholic teaching on the death penalty. The Jesuit cardinal distinguishes between theological affirmations, which allow for the death penalty in certain instances, and their practical application to contemporary contexts. By virtue of their office, the church’s pastors receive the guidance of the Holy Spirit to apply the principles of justice to public policy on matters like the death penalty.
The entire address deserves thoughtful reading, for it is profoundly and unequivocally against the death penalty and its application. It may be found at

catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=8506

 

[Rau]

The Church’s Shepherds have said otherwise…

Am I right that you are referring to the Shepherds of recent times, who are addressing the issue in the context of the present time?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Don’t ascribe opinions to me that I have never expressed. Nothing whatever in anything I have ever said about capital punishment supports this. It is a complete fabrication and misunderstanding of everything I have said on the subject. You have enough to do with describing your own position. Don’t for a moment believe you can describe mine.

Ender

My own position is clear.
The 5thC is an absolute prohibition against all direct killing be it of the guilty or the innocent.
It is a counsel never to indirectly kill also. Something that priests and religious are also customarily bound to honour.

That is why, it seems, the Magisterium strongly favours the kill translation.
So much richer in implicit meaning than just not murdering.