TPJCatholic:
Preceeding, I said:
I quoted
Genesis: It
is part of the TORAH …
You replied:
First, the first five books of the OT is the Torah, including Deuternony and Genesis.
Are you trying to reassure me that we agree? Otherwise why repeat what I said?
Preceediing, I said:
We do not abandon Genesis as a Mosaic Law
Second, we do NOT live under the law, we live under grace.
Third, I never once said that the NT forbids the DP, you have made that charge against me, yet if you go back and look, you will see that I never once made such an innaccurate claim.
I have posted critical catechism references that reflects the Church’s **actual current **teachings regarding the death penalty. However, you seemed to have missed that reference, so let us go through it together once again:
***2267 ***
***Assuming that the guilty party’s identity and responsibility ***
have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.
==> In the case we are speaking of it appears the guilty party has been identified and the DP is not automatically excluded. However, we must follow Church teachings and ask ourselves “is the DP in this case the ONLY possible way of defending the public against the aggressor” (note:
only possible way).
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 with the dignity of the human person. Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitively taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity "are very rare, if not practically non-existent."
==> In the case we are speaking of, there are most definitely non-lethal means sufficient to defend and protect the people from the aggressor (life in prison without the possibility of parole does the trick).
==> Notice the second portion that speaks about redemption, killing the guilty party takes away the possibility of redemption, which should never be taken lightly. Further notice that the catechism states clearly that it is very rare, if not pratically non-existent, to execute an offender in TODAY’S WORLD.
You have consistently tried to lean on the statements from previous Popes, yet I know you are intelligent enough to realize that during their years in the Papacy the world was much different, the world did not have the prison system that we have today, convicts were routinely capable of escaping prison, which means they would become a direct threat to the public. None of those conditions exist today–not in the United States.
As for out tit-for-tat on Scriptural references, I can post many more, and so can you. We either acknowledge the authority of Jesus’ Church and Magisterium, or we do not. The Church teaches very clearly about the DP, as I demonstrated above, you can either choose to accept the Divine authority the Church has, or you can choose to rely on your own authority…the choice is your’s to make.
A final note: it is deeply disturbing to me to witness the depth of bloodlust present in many posts regarding the DP (and across society in general). It serves us well to remember that every person is loved by our Lord, every person! I pray and hope that Hitler was redeemed before his death. Using your example of Christ on the cross with the thieves, do not forget that one of the thieves was redeemed by Christ just before he died. Loving our enemies was not a suggestion.
