Death penalty and purpose of punishment

[frantony]

We have no abliity to give any man authority. Rather it was Jesus Himself who did so.

*God gives Kings authority to rule nations.

David was anointed as King by God through his priest. But that does not make whatever David said or did correct. David had even committed murder to allow him to lead an adulterous life with his widow of his victim. Davids, popes, and cardinals are human beings with many weaknesses.
Though they are given the power / money / resources to do many good things, because of their humanness, they sometimes commit sins, and speak untruths.

Adam was given power and dominion over everything in this world. But he chose to lose them by eating the apple. So anybody with power or authority are not necessarily model people for a good Christian to follow. They should trust their own conscience more, than depend on another person’s judgement.

No man including Catholics should blindly give up his / her right to choose right from wrong to another human-being or worldly organisation. Freedom of choice is given only to men and angels. Many people (martyrs) including Jesus were prepared to lay down even their lives in preference to obeying their worldly masters.*

But you have me confused. You say you are Catholic, but are denying the one thing that makes Catholics Catholic.

*I am a member of a club, where I go to swim and do workouts. My primary reason to join the club is to gain access to their swimming pool and gym. But they also have a liquor bar, which I don’t visit, because 1) prices are high, and 2) I do not approve of all the things that happen there.

An American need not necessarily believe that the Iraq war or the Vietnam war was legitimate. Even while he is an American, he can or it is even his duty , to fight against corruption, or same sex -marriage, or other things he does not approve of in America.

Being Catholic does not mean that you have to sell your soul. The primary reason for my being a catholic is to follow Jesus Christ- not to follow the cardinals or the priests. As long as what they say is acceptable by my conscience, I will accept it. Otherwise, after I make sure that I am correct and that they are wrong, I will try to correct the wrong practice or tradition in the church in as many ways as possible; writing in Catholic Answers being one of the ways.*

Also, it is not necessarily end times. People have been saying that for 2000 years,

But Jesus has given us indications of how the climate will be during the end times, and I can see some similarities. Also, 2000 years is not a long time for Jesus. We can also have an “end of our personal world” in less than 100 years.

 

[dudleysharp]

*Jesus, in every one of His teachings and His miracles is exhorting us to have hope in the ability of God’s WORD (Jesus) to turn even hopeless situations into something positive.
*

That is the message of salvation, which does nothing to exempt human earthly sanctions, inclusive of the death penalty.

God/Jesus: ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and ‘Whoever curses father or mother must certainly be put to death.’ Matthew 15:4 full context (NAB) www.usccb.org/nab/bible/matthew/matthew15.htm

Jesus: "So Pilate said to (Jesus), “Do you not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you and I have power to crucify you?” Jesus answered (him), “You would have no power over me if it had not been given to you from above.” John 19:10-11

Jesus: Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus, saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us.” The other, however, rebuking him, said in reply, “Have you no fear of God, for you are subject to the same condemnation? And indeed, we have been condemned justly, for the sentence we received corresponds to our crimes, but this man has done nothing criminal.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” (Jesus) replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” Luke 23: 39-43

Jesus: “You have heard the ancients were told, ˜YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER” and “Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court”. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever shall say to his brother, “Raca”, shall be guilty before the supreme court and whoever shall say, “You fool”, shall be guilty enough to go into fiery hell." Matthew 5:17-22.

The Holy Spirit: God, through the power and justice of the Holy Spirit, executed both Ananias and his wife, Saphira. Their crime? Lying to the Holy Spirit - to God - through Peter. Acts 5:1-11.

OT: God: “You shall not accept indemnity in place of the life of a murderer who deserves the death penalty; he must be put to death.” Numbers 35:31 (NAB) full context www.usccb.org/nab/bible/numbers/numbers35.htm

---

Some lesser New Testament scholars

Saint Paul, in his hearing before Festus, states: “if then I am a wrong doer, and have committed anything worthy of death, I do not refuse to die.” Acts 25:11.

St. Augustine: “The same divine law which forbids the killing of a human being allows certain exceptions. Since the agent of authority is but a sword in the hand, and is not responsible for the killing, it is in no way contrary to the commandment “Thou shalt not kill”, for the representative of the State’s authority to put criminals to death, according to the Law or the rule of rational justice.” The City of God, Book 1, Chapter 21

St. Thomas Aquinas finds all biblical interpretations against executions “frivolous”, citing Exodus 22:18, “wrongdoers thou shalt not suffer to live”. Unequivocally, he states," The civil rulers execute, justly and sinlessly, pestiferous men in order to protect the peace of the state." (Summa Contra Gentiles, III, 146

St. Thomas Aquinas: “The fact that the evil, as long as they live, can be corrected from their errors does not prohibit the fact that they may be justly executed, for the danger which threatens from their way of life is greater and more certain than the good which may be expected from their improvement. They also have at that critical point of death the opportunity to be converted to God through repentance. And if they are so stubborn that even at the point of death their heart does not draw back from evil, it is possible to make a highly probable judgement that they would never come away from evil to the right use of their powers.” Summa Contra Gentiles, Book III, 146.

Saint Augustine confirms that " . . . inflicting capital punishment . . . protects those who are undergoing capital punishment from the harm they may suffer . . . through increased sinning which might continue if their life went on." (On the Lord’s Sermon, 1.20.63-64.)

Saint Thomas Aquinas finds that " . . . the death inflicted by the judge profits the sinner, if he be converted, unto the expiation of his crime; and, if he be not converted, it profits so as to put an end to the sin, because the sinner is thus deprived of the power to sin anymore." (Summa Theologica, II-II, 25, 6 ad 2.)

St. Thomas Aquinas: “If a man is a danger to the community, threatening it with disintegration by some wrongdoing of his, then his execution for the healing and preservation of the common good is to be commended. Only the public authority, not private persons, may licitly execute malefactors by public judgement. Men shall be sentenced to death for crimes of irreparable harm or which are particularly perverted.” Summa Theologica, 11; 65-2; 66-6.

Saint (& Pope) Pius V, “The just use of (executions), far from involving the crime of murder, is an act of paramount obedience to this (Fifth) Commandment which prohibits murder.” “The Roman Catechism of the Council of Trent” (1566).

Pope Pius XII: “When it is a question of the execution of a man condemned to death it is then reserved to the public power to deprive the condemned of the benefit of life, in expiation of his fault, when already, by his fault, he has dispossessed himself of the right to live.” 9/14/52.

 

[frantony]

,
Please refer to the earlier posts, because all the above issues have already been addressed and dealt with in the earlier posts.
First, you should decide whether to follow Jesus or popes and saints and some lesser New Testament scholars, especially when their teachings do not align with each other.
Jesus has always exhorted men to be merciful to sinners.
Jesus always saved sinners from death instead of condemning them to death.
In most of His miracles and teachings he asked the people to have hope for the better, and to have faith in Him (the WORD) and its power to turn the worst situation into a life and health and virtue, when there is faith.
He saved a prostitute (Mary Magdeline) from being stoned to death, and due to faith in His power, unlike how Aquinas and Augustine says, she turned away from her bad ways and became a saint
Jesus has power over the natural world and the supernatural world and we see He has power over disease and death. Jesus is the Messiah, He can deal with any problem and He can be trusted to turn the worst hopeless situation of death into one of hope and life.
He raised dead people and even rotten bodies back to life.
He cured blind and deaf people.
He cured mentally de-ranged and posessed people.
He is asking us not to despairand lose hope, but to to have faith in His power to turn all bad things (however hopeless or dead or rotten it is) into virtuous results with healthy life.
How can followers of such a Jesus condemn a man (however bad, or a sinner he may be) to death and deny him a chance to repent correct himself, and become a saint like Mary Magdeline?

 

[AHapka]

How can followers of such a Jesus condemn a man (however bad, or a sinner he may be) to death and deny him a chance to repent correct himself, and become a saint like Mary Magdeline?

Might have something to do with the way he didn’t interfere with the thief on the cross; punishment and instead accepted his chance to repent, and also become a saint.

 

[frantony]

I’d just like to comment on JPII’s words on the death penalty. There seems to be a contradiction.

So, instead of the death penalty being a suitable punishment because it is a just punishment commensurate to the crime, it is a suitable punishment and should be used only when it is necessary to defend society. Thus, in this case of the death penalty, JPII replaces the primary purpose of punishment (justice) with a secondary purpose (defense of society).

So, how can one reconcile these conflicting ideas?

JPII is a man of conscience and cannot reconcile with what is in the CCC. But because he has to honour the Catholic Church’s tradition to roll in the mud in preference to accepting that there has been a mistake (like in the case of inquisition and in many other occassions) , he was under pressure to take a middle path, which is now very visible as a contradiction.

 

[frantony]

Might have something to do with the way he didn’t interfere with the thief on the cross; punishment and instead accepted his chance to repent, and also become a saint.

But Jesus was not the person who accused him and put him on the cross.
Do you think that Jesus should have done a miracle and saved the thief from death, when Jesus himsellf was hanging on the cross?
Jesus’ not rescuing the thief from the cross is no justification for his crucifixation by the Romans.