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Shannon9791
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I’m sorry, but I mis-spoke. Derrick Todd Lee has yet to be executed, but is currently on Death Row.
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Ender
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One of the difficulties associated with your position is the fact that for nearly 2000 years the Church held exactly the stances you consider to be oxymoronic. I do not accept that what was considered heresy in the past (that capital punishment was immoral) should be accepted as doctrine today.
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bitznbitez
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I assume you reference this case described below and with the court record here : lasc.org/opinions/93ka2692.opn.pdf
This is precisely why I cannot fathom opposition to the death penalty. There was a time in Christian Europe ( ok this isn’t Europe but work with me ) when a chap like this would have had a stone tied round him and be dropped off the bridge, or any number of other things.
The current balyhoo centers around the current method of execution, and perhaps the new one they are dreaming up, will cause suffering. We aren’t upset about suffering, if we were truly upset about suffering he’d have been strung up long ago. We are upset about bad guys suffering.
Justice is turned on its head when a society worries about imparting suffering to someone who did such a thing. No wonder the death penalty is described as not a deterrent. Now the rack, the pincers, so on and so forth followed by green wood, that would be a deterrent. I have hopes we can someday return to civilization.
We can care about his soul. We can let him seek forgiveness and then promptly send him round to see if it worked.
…
That said I’ll still become Catholic, wouldn’t be a true catholic if I didn’t have one thing to disagree about
and I will hope that in the end ancient tradition wins the day.
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Spider42
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Catholics respect the Bible, after all, we compiled it! But we also rely on Holy Tradition and a living Magisterium. Take a couple of your examples:
In both these cases (and I could provide many more), it was clearly recognized that there is a tension between the death penalty and the 5th Commandment, not to mention the two commandments of love, the foundation of the moral law (Matthew). The Catholic Catechism explicitly places all 10 Commandments in the context of these highest commandments. So the argument is not that the death penalty is, itself, inherently just, but that it best promotes the foundation of the moral law. If you do not believe me, let’s look more closely at both the examples above:
The dogmatic understanding of the Catholic Church (Gaudium et spes) is that the right to life is the most fundamental of all inalienable rights. It cannot be be rightfully abridged by man or state. The death penalty is not an exception, but a pragmatic reality that, at the time of the writings above, was the best balance to, overall, promote life.
But the Living Magisterium recognizes that the situation has changed. As Blessed John Paul explained in Evangelium Vitae, modern societies do not need the death penalty to insure the safety of others and can afford the burden of supporting/sustaining prisoners in jail. So the right to life, which belongs to all, and the opportunity for salvation, which also belongs to all, has become the dominant moral requirement.
This is based on the Pastoral Constitution of the Church, explained in an Encyclical letter, and stated clearly in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC 2267).
Catholics cannot make such an argument. After all, we have the living Magisterium, the people who compiled the Bible, and Church Tradition, which proceeds the Bible as we know it today by almost 4 centuries.
We believe in an apostolic church, that is, the Magisterium, most especially the Vicar of Christ, have the apostolic moral authority described by St. Paul in the New Testament. There is no doubt that the Magisterium strongly opposes and wants to seriously limit the use of the death penalty in the modern age. As a State, the Vatican just supported a UN resolution on the death penalty and two Vicars of Christ, one of them Blessed John Paul, have directly called on US Catholics to stop using the death penalty and promoting a culture of death.
Catholics can be in dissent with the Church on this. And, at this time, the Holy Father has expressed his opinion that such dissent does not inherently disqualify individuals from receiving Sacraments. But we cannot licitly argue that we are inarguably right and multiple Vicars of Christ are wrong (Lumen Gentium #25). That is a form of schism that can potentially incur latae sententiae; automatic excommunication (c.731, c.1364). This would disqualify one from receiving Sacraments until the instructive punishment is lifted by a bishop (though bishops can empower priests under them to lift certain punishments under certain conditions in normal reconcilliation).
I’m sorry, Catholics can’t make that argument either. We take a very broad view of the 8th Commandment. We would not be allowed to fragment the teaching and distort it’s meaning:
And we would be required to read not just this paragraph, which provides witness to Sacred History for the 5th Commandment, that shedding blood is shedding life, but also read the 7 paragraphs, which explain proper application in different situations, including the death penalty.
I know that the constraints of Catholicism can be confusing to our fellow Christians, but we are biblical literalists. Our Church is structured exactly as described by St. Paul and we take the teachings of Christ in the New Testament as, literally, instructions from God.
Pax Christi
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Ender
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And that Tradition has been, at least since Innocent I, that the death penalty is a just punishment for (at least) the crime of murder.
I dispute your interpretation of both those citations; there is no tension between capital punishment and the 5th commandment. What was said at Trent was that an execution *“is an act of paramount obedience to this Commandment which prohibits murder.**” *Where is the tension in acting in “paramount obedience” with something?
I don’t know what you mean by “promot[ing] the foundation of the moral law” but I disagree with your claim: the death penalty itself is inherently just if any punishment can make that claim.
If life is an inalienable right that cannot be abridged then how is it that we are justified in taking a life in order to secure our own safety? How does our security allow us to abridge an inalienable right?
There are four objectives of punishment; one is primary and the other three are secondary. Security is a secondary objective and while capital punishment may (or may not) be needed by modern societies, the primary objective - retributive justice - has not changed and the action necessary to satisfy its demands are unaltered.
Once again, we understand that section differently.
*The Pope and the bishops, using their prudential judgment, have concluded that in contemporary society, at least in countries like our own, the death penalty ought not to be invoked, because, on balance, it does more harm than good. *(Cardinal Dulles, 2001)
The Church’s position on capital punishment is in fact based on Gen 9:6 (and Rom 13:1-4). It is a position and Tradition that has not unchanged.
No one disputes this. The issue is whether this is a doctrinal change or a prudential judgment. I see no justification for believing the 2000 year Tradition of the Church on this subject has changed.
You have misinterpreted Cardinal Ratzinger’s memo on this as well. It is not reasonable to believe he said Catholics could legitimately dissent from Church teaching. What he said was that a diversity of opinions about the application of the death penalty was legitimate.
It is not fragmenting a teaching to point out the conflict between 2260 and 2267. 2260 cites the precept: the life of the murderer is forfeit. 2267 is a pragmatic exception.
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Swiss_Guy
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Well personally I’m against the death penalty, BUT…
how is it NOT justified Biblically? The Old Testament clearly shows that God is not opposed to the death penalty, and neither is the New Testament with St. Paul speaking of it in Romans 13. I don’t see any of the early Christians complaining to God saying, “Hey! We’re supposed to be against the death penalty since we’re prolife! Why’d you let Ananias and Sapphira die for disrupting the Christian community? I’m more Biblical and prolife than you, God!”
Catholic Tradition is unequivocally in favor of the death penalty in principle. The Catechism of Trent says:
Another kind of lawful slaying belongs to the civil authorities, to whom is entrusted power of life and death, by the legal and judicious exercise of which they punish the guilty and protect the innocent. The just use of this power, far from involving the crime of murder, is an act of paramount obedience to this Commandment which prohibits murder. The end of the Commandment� is the preservation and security of human life. Now the punishments inflicted by the civil authority, which is the legitimate avenger of crime, naturally tend to this end, since they give security to life by repressing outrage and violence. Hence these words of David: In the morning I put to death all the wicked of the land, that I might cut off all the workers of iniquity from the city of the Lord.
St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine both are in favor of the death penalty. Even the present Catechism is in favor of the death penalty:
2266 The State’s effort to contain the spread of behaviors injurious to human rights and the fundamental rules of civil coexistence corresponds to the requirement of watching over the common good. Legitimate public authority has the right and duty to inflict penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime. the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense. When his punishment is voluntarily accepted by the offender, it takes on the value of expiation. Moreover, punishment, in addition to preserving public order and the safety of persons, has a medicinal scope: as far as possible it should contribute to the correction of the offender.
That’s basically how you justify Biblically and from Tradition. But you also asked for my view. I’m against the death penalty, 100% today. I don’t think the modern world should ever use it. That’s not saying I’m against the death penalty in principle. The death penalty is used primarily for the purpose of retribution, or satisfying justice, provided the good effects won’t outweigh the bad in defending the public order (so basically the death penalty is a form of societal self-defense). However, the Church has spoken out about the death penalty in recent years. I agree with Bl. Pope John Paul II’s judgment that not using capital punishment "better correspond(s) to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person, as well as the fact that the situations needed to execute criminals *‘today … are very rare, if not practically non-existent.’ [John Paul II, Evangelium vitae 56.] *
I also find Cardinal Schonborn’s (Archbishop of Vienna) analysis interesting. He says in Living the Catechism of the Catholic Church 41 that *In the light of the Gospel the Church will continue in practice, with ever greater clarity and determination, to proclaim love for one’s enemies, as Jesus did, and to say “No” to the death penalty. * It brings to light the fact that in the present day the way the death penalty is administered is contrary to the Gospel. The Catholic Church will continue to say “No” to the death penalty, not because she is against it in principle, but because in practice it is better for the common good if it is not used, and because (perhaps most importantly) we live in a violent post-Christian society where the Church can no longer effectively oversee if the death penalty is being administered justly; we are also so used to violence the death penalty is only furthering the culture of death. I think the Holy See protesting the execution of Saddam Hussein is evidence enough of the Church’s opposition to the death penalty today.
Don’t even get started on the Bible.
Catholics can still be staunchly pro-life and yet support the death penalty because the Catholic Church has always held it to be morally permissible.
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Swiss_Guy
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Another thing:
People against the death penalty in principle often use CCC 2267 to justify themselves. Here it is:
*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.
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 are more in conformity to 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 definitely 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.”*
I think those against the death penalty in principle because of 2267 need to get a better understanding of Church Tradition and where the Church is coming from when saying this.
(I’ll go by sentence here)
*In my original article and in my answers to the criticisms I seek to maintain the reflective and critical posture of a theologian, not the urgency of an advocate or the stridency of a crusader. Activists on both sides may see my position as too nuanced. I insist on the moral and theological relevance of prudential considerations. Kevin Doyle fears that people who use their own prudence will be imprudent; but I would hold that they are morally accountable if they disregard the prudential judgment of the hierarchical leaders, who speak with authority even when they are not handing on the word of the Lord (cf. 1 Corinthians 7:25). Since prudence is a moral virtue, I cannot accept the dichotomy implied in George Blair’s statement, “Arguments against the death penalty are prudential, not moral.” The decision whether and when to apply the death penalty cannot be properly made on the basis of abstract dogmatic considerations alone. Christian moral reasoning calls for a high degree of prudence.
People against the death penalty in principle often use CCC 2267 to justify themselves. Here it is:
*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.
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 are more in conformity to 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 definitely 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.”*
I think those against the death penalty in principle because of 2267 need to get a better understanding of Church Tradition and where the Church is coming from when saying this.
(I’ll go by sentence here)
- The 1st part of 2267 seems like a slap in the face to traditional Catholic teaching when it says, “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.” It seems like a contradiction because, as Cardinal Avery Dulles shows, along with other saints, retribution is the #1 reason for the death penalty, not defending human lives like 2267 says. But the Church isn’t concerned merely with the physical lives of us. No, she is concerned with both the physical and spiritual elements of human life. Our modern society is so materialistic that when even good Catholics read this they think in purely materialistic terms. I know that’s exactly what I thought a while back when reading this. But because “defending human lives” automatically includes our moral well-being, this clearly is not in contradiction with traditional Catholic teaching, where the death penalty must only be used if the good effects won’t outweigh the bad. Clearly if the moral health of society is harmed more from a person who is lawfully executed to satisfy justice than if they weren’t executed, the Church teaches (and has always taught) the execution should no longer occur. (We can eliminate the question of physical defense of society when from the question of what this means because if the criminal is executed there is no longer any need of physical defense, not to mention it is already a well established fact that physical defense of society is a secondary purpose of CP.)
- This is when we cross the line from Church doctrine into prudential judgment. Here it is the former Pope’s (and evidently the present Pope’s since he oversaw the entire process of putting together the Catechism) prudential judgment that using non-lethal means is more in keeping with the common good. I personally agree, and based on their statements I would suspect so does most of the hierarchy. I think it is especially important to note that if prudential judgment is inserted into the Catechism that is teaching Church doctrine, it is in the Church’s eyes a very important judgment that shouldn’t be taken lightly.
- Basically the same as above in 2. The actions of the Holy See indicate that “very rare, if not practically non-existent” in practice basically means “non-existent”. On a topic that is in the Church’s eyes important enough to include the prudential judgment of some of the Church’s best thinkers in a long time, I think it is pretty tough to disagree with them.
*In my original article and in my answers to the criticisms I seek to maintain the reflective and critical posture of a theologian, not the urgency of an advocate or the stridency of a crusader. Activists on both sides may see my position as too nuanced. I insist on the moral and theological relevance of prudential considerations. Kevin Doyle fears that people who use their own prudence will be imprudent; but I would hold that they are morally accountable if they disregard the prudential judgment of the hierarchical leaders, who speak with authority even when they are not handing on the word of the Lord (cf. 1 Corinthians 7:25). Since prudence is a moral virtue, I cannot accept the dichotomy implied in George Blair’s statement, “Arguments against the death penalty are prudential, not moral.” The decision whether and when to apply the death penalty cannot be properly made on the basis of abstract dogmatic considerations alone. Christian moral reasoning calls for a high degree of prudence.
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Spider42
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It is in the Universal Catechism, the US Catechism, and multiple Encyclicals. Technically, it is doctrine. What it is not is dogma. I know you harp on it relentlessly, but in Canon law there is no clear distinction between judgement and doctrine. This is because the Dogmatic Constitution of the Church makes no such distinction:
Doctrine is what the Magisterium teaches, Dogma is teachings that are held to be infallible and unchanging.
Cardinal Ratzinger’s note was not addressed to the laity and his instructions were that it cannot be correctly understood without complete context. I would not presume to disobey and publicly interpret it.
I referred only to Sacramentum Caritatis and the often quoted article from Cardinal Dulles.
You do not seem to understand the Church’s definition of dissent:
When a Catholic disagrees with what the Church teaches, particular what it teaches in writing and collegially, it is ‘dissent’. But dissent does not automatically disqualify one from, say, receiving Sacraments. That depends on the level of the teaching. Again, from Donum Veritatis:
The US Bishops asked Rome if the teaching falls under the 2nd paragraph or the 3rd. Because licit applications are at least possible, it falls under the 3rd.
The problem isn’t disagreeing with the Vicar of Christ. No Catholic can go against the certainty of his or her moral conscience (CCC 1790). What can be a problem is arguing that anything the Church teaches can simply be disregarded.
I could discuss death penalty with you, but, again, you have related your arguments to your interpretation of apostolic Church. This subject I cannot debate so, again, I must respectfully disengage.
Peace
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Ender
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Although we have opposite opinions on the use of capital punishment I agree with your explanation of what the Biblical and Traditional view actually is.
I also agree with this; it is clearly in keeping with Aquinas’ explanation - as well as being eminently reasonable.
I don’t think this evaluation holds; self-defense might allow killing but I don’t think it can be extended to include executions.
I have trouble with this assertion since it is precisely the dignity of the human person on which Gen 9:6 - which commands the death of the murderer - is based.
This assertion also seems problematic. On what basis can we say that executing someone shows we don’t love him while putting him in prison for life shows that we do? Beyond that, it is a personal obligation to love our enemies but it is the obligation of the state to punish the criminal.
Wait, you just put forward a compelling explanation for the Biblical and Traditional position the Church has always had on capital punishment. On what basis do you claim it is now being administered contrary to the Gospel when in the past it was used much more extensively even by the Church?
I agree that this is the current position. I just want to be clear that the Church’s objections to its use are prudential and not moral (for lack of a better term that would incorporate Dulles’ comment).
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Ender
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Regarding sentence one of 2267: it appears to be factually wrong. The Traditional teaching of the Church never included the caveat that capital punishment was acceptable only if necessary for protection. This assertion is incorrect.*The most reasonable conclusion to draw from this discussion is that, once again, the Catechism is simply wrong from an historical point of view. Traditional Catholic teaching did not contain the restriction enunciated by Pope John Paul II. *(Kevin L. Flannery S.J., Professor, Pontifical Gregorian Univ - Rome, 2007)
Sentence three, which is an evaluation of the capabilities of modern prison systems, is undeniably an opinion. In order to defend the assertion one would have to turn to something like the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Church doctrine surely cannot turn on statistical analysis.
Sentence two seems to most closely align with Dulles’ comment about prudence being a moral virtue as a defense of the position JPII took on capital punishment. Unfortunately it bases its opposition on the claim that capital punishment is not *“in conformity to the dignity of the human person.” *This seems to turn Gen 9:6 on its head in that 2267 claims the murderer’s life is protected by his human dignity while in Genesis God declared that the murderer’s life was forfeit because of the human dignity of his victim.
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Brendan
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I too feel that it should be rarely, if ever used. But in regards to your point, Pope Pius XII gave a talk to Medical Professionals in 1952. The thrust of that talk was on the need to preserve the Right to Life. But His Holiness also noted the following distinction
-(Pius XII, Address to the First International Congress of Histopathology of the Nervous System, 14 September 1952, XIV, 328)
One additional note, one that is rarely discussed currently, but Pope Pius addressed, is expiation. That the acceptance of the just punishment removes the temporal punishment due to sin.
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Swiss_Guy
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I disagree with you when you say the Catechism is factually wrong. Avery Cardinal Dulles once said this:
- According to the classical tradition itself, punishment should not be inflicted when the infliction does more harm than good. Prof. Charles errs in stating that this prudential principle is “unsupported either by scriptural confirmation or tradition.” Thomas Aquinas asserts that the execution of the wicked is forbidden when it cannot be done without danger to the good (SCG 146.9; cf. ST II-II, q. 43, art. 7, ad 1). As biblical warrant he refers to Matthew 13:29, and as traditional warrant he cites the teaching of Augustine in his Contra Epistulam Parmeniani.
Cardinal Dulles also mentions in a separate article:
*It is at least plausible to think…that when the Pope speaks of the protection of society as grounds for using the death penalty, he may have more in mind than mere physical defense against the individual criminal. To vindicate the order of justice and to sustain the moral health of society and the security of innocent persons against potential criminals it may be appropriate to punish certain crimes by death. *
The second sentence doesn’t seem to turn Scripture “on its head”. If a criminal is executed unnecessarily (meaning it would satisfy the retribution aspect of capital punishment but not be healthy for society), then it is more in keeping with the dignity of the human person, both the innocent human person who would be morally corrupted from the punishment and the criminal, if capital punishment doesn’t take place.
The third sentence is not merely an opinion. It is a prudential judgment from Pope John Paul II and apparently not in contradiction with our current Pope’s judgment, seeing as he was the one who oversaw the Catechism’s development.
In fact here is what Cardinal Ratzinger once said about the Ordinary Magisterium and prudential judgment:
- Such teachings are, however, an authentic expression of the ordinary Magisterium of the Roman Pontiff or of the College of Bishops and therefore require religious submission of will and intellect. They are set forth in order to arrive at a deeper understanding of revelation, or to recall the conformity of a teaching with the truths of faith, or lastly to warn against ideas incompatible with these truths or against dangerous opinions that can lead to error.
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Swiss_Guy
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I think moral self-defense can and should be extended to include executions.
But when our modern society, which is morally backward, thinks that capital punishment is not based off of the dignity of the human person but its degradation, it isn’t really going to be beneficial to the common good or the person’s human dignity.
We are giving them a chance to repent and come to Christ. That sounds like love to me.
It is also an obligation to show love even in public life or through the state. Caritas in Veritate 7 states:
Every Christian is called to practise this charity, in a manner corresponding to his vocation and according to the degree of influence he wields in the pólis. This is the institutional path — we might also call it the political path — of charity, no less excellent and effective than the kind of charity which encounters the neighbour directly, outside the institutional mediation of the pólis. When animated by charity, commitment to the common good has greater worth than a merely secular and political stand would have.
Because we live in a post-Christian society where those administering CP are almost always going to use it in a way that is not in accord with Church teaching. It’s about who is executing the criminal. (I would also argue it wasn’t the Church per se that used CP but that’s a different topic.) In fact, I suppose in a society like Malta where everyone is Catholic it could be imprudent to use CP since the world community is looking on, similar to how it probably wouldn’t be prudent in the same country to not allow freedom of religion.
I disagree with the “prudential vs moral” dichotomy, since I see it in direct contradiction with both Ratzinger and Dulles. But perhaps you can show me I am misunderstanding you or something like that.
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Spider42
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I’m obligated to point out a theological ramification of this argument.
For Catholics, life is dogmatically held to be an inalienable right of the human person, which cannot be licitly abridged by state or man. This is both part of the Patoral Constitution of the Church, and was determined to be infallible via the universal agreement of the Magisterium in Evangelium Vitae.
This means that, dogmatically, all applications of the death penalty, throughout history, were only licit via double effect.
Arguing that the death penalty is, itself, directly licit does challenge a dogmatic teaching of the Church, that is, it implies that the Magisterium, acting at its most infallible (unity with papal support) errantly changed dogma or was denied the Gift of Authority.
As a factual matter, you appear to be wrong, for example:
So the Church has taught that the point is defense of human life. Just as importantly, look at one of the most vocal proponents of the death penalty in Church history, St. Thomas Aquinas. To the question of our obligation to evangelization and affording every human being the opportunity for redemption he replied:
So, the ‘obvious’ mitigating factor was protecting others. And, it brings up that tradition was mixed. Aquinas was responding to both prior and contemporary apologists and theologians on the subject. So tradition was mixed, because of the moral tension between killing and the 5th Commandment.
I know that won’t make an impact on your thinking, but the first point above is important. Catholic teachings do not exist in isolation, the faith is a seemless whole. If you argue that the death penalty has ever been licit for reasons other than defense, then you are arguing that the Church’s dogmatic position on the inalienable right to life of every person is incorrect.
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Ender
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I accept Dulles’ comment but it isn’t relevant to the point. The first part of 2267 isn’t about whether someone else will be harmed if a criminal is executed (Dulles) but about whether it is necessary to execute someone if he is not a threat to society. If 2267 had claimed that society would be harmed by continued executions that would have been both a stronger argument and consistent with Church teaching, but that wasn’t the path that was taken.
We are agreed on this point and it is probable that JPII believed that executions presented just such a risk … but that is not the argument being made. It is one thing to argue for an exception to the precept but quite another to argue that the precept is itself wrong.
I won’t argue that 2267 isn’t a muddle.*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., 2003)
It seems pretty thin to think that the comment about the dignity of the human person referred to society in general especially as it follows a comment about the common good that addresses the “health of society.” But claiming that not executing the criminal is more in keeping with his dignity does reverse the meaning of Gen 9:6. Even if the case could be made that society was negatively effected this does not change the nature of the crime or the justness of the punishment. That an external reason argues against his execution does not change the basis for the precept that murderers are to be executed … because of the nature of the life that was taken.
How would you defend the validity of the claim 2267 makes? There is nothing in the 2000 years of Church documentation that you could turn to. You would have to find studies of social scientists. Beyond that, I seriously doubt you could get a consensus even on the definition of what it meant to “effectively repress crime”.
Only the very last statement in your citation applied to prudential teaching and it surely cannot apply to every position in opposition to them. Dulles was quite clear on this: *“To differ from such a judgment, therefore, is not to dissent from Church teaching.” *Prudential judgments are owed respect, not assent.
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Ender
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The problem involves intent. (CCC 2263):* “The act of self-defense can have a double effect: the preservation of one’s own life; and the killing of the aggressor… the one is intended, the other is not.”*
In the execution of a prisoner the death is intended. That is the whole purpose of the act: to terminate a life, so it is difficult to see how an execution can be justified as an act of self defense when self defense explicitly requires that we not intend the killing. Beyond that it cannot be argued that the principle of double effect allows it inasmuch as that principle demands that the beneficial aspect of the act not be the result of the harmful effect. In other words we cannot derive our benefit from the execution even though that is exactly its source.
Perhaps so, this is a reasonable argument.
But this isn’t and it is this assertion I reject.
God gives us all the opportunity to come to Christ and we are not able to thwart his plans.
These things are not mutually exclusive.*Why destroy, by not loving, the one on whom you sit in judgment? Because what you are destroying is justice, by not loving the one on whom you sit in justice. “But penalties must be applied.” I don’t deny it, I don’t forbid it; only let it be done in a spirit of love, a spirit of caring, a spirit of reforming. *(Augustine, sermon 13)
I don’t understand this comment. If a man receives a fair trial, is found clearly guilty, and is formally sentenced, and finally executed this is exactly in accord with Church teaching. You may object that it is not perceived this way but that is very different than arguing about what is objectively true.
The Papal States had their own official executioner at least until 1865.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_Battista_Bugatti
My attempt at clarity clearly wasn’t clear. Surely you would accept the distinction between prudential and doctrinal?
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estesbob
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I oppose the Death Penalty in all cases. My Church does not.
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estesbob
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*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.
Pope Benedict XVI
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Ender
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