The sacraments are of course good in themselves, but they are not actions. The receiving of the sacrament is an action and so receiving them with a bad intent would be wrong. Remember that movie in which someone tried to frame a priest for murder by confessing to him?
There is a reason things can be intrinsically bad but not intrinsically good. The morality of an act is determined by the nature of the action itself and the intent behind it (and to a lesser extent by the circumstances). If either of these is bad then the act is bad. Something that is intrinsically bad is bad in all circumstances so the intent is irrelevant. An act cannot be intrinsically good - that is, good in all situations - because the intent may be bad, which makes the action bad. If something was intrinsically good then it would have to mean that the intent behind the act wouldn’t matter, but this can never be the case.
Actually it is, as is shown by the fact that the church has always recognized it as a just punishment, and as we know that morality cannot change with time or place, it will always be a just punishment.
The selection of bishops is also subject to prudential judgment but this hardly means that the office of bishop is not an enduring institution.
As I understand, Capital Punishment was also about Justice. This is usually referred to as the medicinal and punitive value of Capital Punishment.
What has been almost completely lost in discussions about capital punishment is the entire concept of justice and the nature of punishment itself. The church recognizes that punishment has four valid objectives: retribution, rehabilitation, deterrence, and protection, and of these four the primary objective is retribution - retributive justice.
Yes, and I think as the article expresses, the absence in the CCC of this aspect of Capital Punishment may have lead people to think of it primarily as a protective measure. It may also have to do with the pervading mentality in our culture today that sinners and sins should be tolerated as long as they do not pose an immediate threat to us (the “let them be” attitude).
), I think we can preserve the full effects of Capital Punishment without actually ending the life.Actually, based on the content of the CCC continuing to kill while incarcerated it wouldn’t qualify as jails and prisons are big into isolation cells where extremely dangerous criminals or criminals that have killed in jail/got into fights/have attacked others. They also have many restraining ways that they use, so then again there are other non lethal ways to be ways to be used so capital punishment would not be permitted. Again, the only way within a jail in which capital punishment would be allowed that it can be thought is similar to mass shooting, a massive riot in which the police has lost total control of the population and someone has a gun and is killing everybody (similar to the mass shooting) and the only way to regain control of the facility would be for the police to shoot at the aggressor. Again besides that situation I cannot think of any other situation that can possibly pass the CCC’s exceptions.
In your scenario, the killing is not a punishment, it is an act of self defense.
Yes but Ender is saying that capital punishment is not the action but an ‘institution’ basically in the way that the sacraments are an ‘institution’. He says that when Pope JPII said that capital punishment is cruel and unnecessary, that he must be saying that this ’ special nature’ is cruel and unnecessary and that can’t be true because doctrines can’t change. There would never be an occasion where you would say that the sacraments are cruel and unnecessary or that praying was cruel and unnecessary or that justice was cruel and unnecessary. Pope John Paul was very deliberate in showing the nature of capital punishment as having no ‘special nature’.
Those concepts have not been lost at all. It seems like a problem to you because you are clinging to a defunct pre-Christian theology with regards to capital punishment. When God gave Noah Gen 6:9 is was like a chicken laying an egg. You have this thing and you call it an egg. You see and know it as a hard oval fragile thing that has great importance in protecting what is inside. You treat it with reverence as you transport it from the chook yard to the kitchen. Then comes time to create an omelette and the egg is cracked open. That’s when we really see and know the egg. We now call the contents ‘the egg’. The hard fragile case is now just the shell. It served a purpose in getting the essence of the egg from A to B, but it is no longer necessary and it would in fact be cruel to the diners to try cramming the shell into the omelette as a vital and intrinsic part of the egg. Jesus came to crack eggs and make omelettes. We’ve tasted omelettes and love them to bits. We still value egg shells but only in the role of service in the process that leads to our banquet. We know now what the egg really is (nutritious edible food) and what justice really means (love thy neighbour as you love yourself).
What do you make of Cardinal Dulles explanation…
The the exceptions have swallowed the rule in its totality. There is no real circumstance in which any CP can fit into what CCC says. Basically then they are saying we leave it to the government but no real circumstance can be moral.
and
I think this would lay to rest any claim the Capital Punishment is a “a defunct pre-Christian theology”
and:
And Cardinal Dulles writes:
When one is trying to create a just society, the cost of CP, should not be the issue. Justice should be.The the exceptions have swallowed the rule in its totality. There is no real circumstance in which any CP can fit into what CCC says. Basically then they are saying we leave it to the government but no real circumstance can be moral.
Actually from a legal perspective confinement is better. CP costs is much higher than keeping someone imprisoned. You are missing that there is a very long and complicated process before getting to that point which in the end costs states millions of dollars. New York reinstated it in 1995 and it was overturned by the Courts in 2004 because usually it causes more problems than nothing to the State (9 years no one condemned to execution was executed and they spent 170 million in just a handful of people). That is why I. said the article was nice but if they are missing the legal perspective they are off don reality.
No, I wasn’t saying that capital punishment is a “defunct pre-Christian theology”… I’m saying Enders concept of it is. This is the culmination of who knows how many months of discussion I’ve endured with Ender.
and that’s been done. The Church will only support capital punishment in the most extreme circumstances of which there are very few examples these days, to the end of protecting society. That’s what the Church is teaching us as Catholics.
But this is why I am so puzzled trying to understand this… The state has no duty to “justly” punish crimes. That is an utopia statement that any lawyer or judge or person that works with Courts knows and can tell you is totally false (in fact as one of.my law school professors used to say, if you are looking for.justice you are in the wrong path and wrong career). CP is not required for justice in 2013 and it hasn’t been for.many years. The CCC says that the guilt has to be fully determined and the responsibility too. That is plain impossible unless the person is caught in the act by police, which still doesn’t fit the CCC because at trial you have three policemen testifying and the three policemen say something completely different. All the state tries to do is punish people within the best of limited abilities i.e. their percentage of failure is quite high, they know it and they don’t put too much effort in improving it. so how do you make CP fitting of it is not for justice and if it first fit any of the requirements in the CCC. That is my difficulty reading all this.
This is what I understand from the CCC, the church only supports it in practically non existing circumstances, the only one I can thing is mass shooters. In these days I have real difficulty finding a case in which the church supports it.
As I said before, while I personally hold that Capital Punishment should probably be removed from the legal system today, we cannot deny that it is a valid method of punishment.
I have never said this. This may be your interpretation of my position but it is a concept I have never used. I’m not sure why you would think I believe executing someone is not an action.
You again ascribe to me a position I have never taken. I frankly don’t understand JPII’s comment: how can a punishment accepted (even if only in theory) by the church today be considered cruel? Are we saying the church accepts cruelty?
Let me point out that the understanding of punishment remains unchanged even in the 1997 version of the catechism, although it is presented in such a way as to confuse most who read it. There has also been no change in the concept of justice. The only thing to change has been the (prudential) opposition to the death penalty.
Then how do you explain section 2260 which, in referring to Gn 9:6 says:* “This teaching remains necessary for all time”*?
Once again his comments don’t coincide with your interpretation: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets;* I have come** not to **abolish **but to fulfill.*” (Mt 5:17)
I think he was explaining why JPII opposed capital punishment: because modern states have lost even their symbolic anticipation of God’s justice. Dulles supported JPII’s position against using the death penalty but he recognized that the opposition was prudential and not moral.
Apparently you consider the book of Genesis to be an example of pre-Christian theology which begs the question of how that can be if it is the church herself which cites it. It is not that I have cited Gn 9:6; I have been citing church references to that passage. If it is quoted in its entirety in the current catechism how can it be dismissed as “pre-Christian theology”?
Apparently without understanding most of what I’ve been saying.
I’ll try this again: the primary objective of all punishment - according to the catechism - is not protecting society. It is retribution - retributive justice. CCC 2266: The primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.
If you assume it is impossible for the state to punish crimes with perfect justice then it seems there are only two alternatives: do the best you can or stop trying. Unless you are suggesting the state should not concern itself with justice then I see no alternative to doing our best and accept the shortcomings. In any event, the church teaches that the state has not just the right but the duty to punish crimes and to do so as justly as it can.CCC 2266 *"Legitimate public authority has the right and **duty *to inflict penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime."
One of the main purposes of government is to establish Justice. If the state fails in this enterprise, the state can be removed and another set up in it’s place.
Again that is a moral point of view. What is moral and what is legal are two completely different things. CP is a legal concept. And I think that is why the CCC is written I’m that way because you have to address it from a legal point of view.