Is the Death Penalty intrinsically evil?

[Caveman]

And since there is no official Church teaching on whether or not it is intrinsically evil the question cannot be asked the way it is being asked here.

That’s a cop out, GJ, and you know it. In light that the Church does leave tyhe door open, the question answers itself.

 

[Ender]

And since there is no official Church teaching on whether or not it is intrinsically evil the question cannot be asked the way it is being asked here.

The catechism is quite clear: “The traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude …recourse to the death penalty”. However many caveats may surround and limit its use, its use is sometimes permitted. The fact that it is permitted in even a single case means that it cannot be intrinsically evil as intrinsically evil acts (e.g. abortion) are never permitted in any situation. Given that the Vatican had the death penalty on her books until the mid 1960’s it really is impossible to argue that the Church defines capital punishment as intrinsically evil.

rlg94086:

Do you believe that the current Catechism is in error on the death penalty?

Yes.

There are a number of practical reasons put forward to oppose the death penalty: its cost, possible execution of innocent people, it is not applied fairly, etc, but since the OP asks about the moral nature of the death penalty I think it appropriate to limit the discussion to that aspect alone.

Punishment has four aims: retribution, rehabilitation, deterrence, and defense against the criminal. Of these, the primary one is retribution; that is, guilt calls for punishment. (2266) “the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.” The problem with the section in the catechism regarding the death penalty is that it addresses solely the issue of protection and ignores the need for the retribution that justice demands. I think at some point this section will have to be reworked.

Ender

 

[rlg94086]

So RLG doesn’t spend too much time scratching his head wondering how someone who is still alive can serve as an example of a wrongful execution (and other reader’s don’t think proof of this type of tragedy was actually provided) Ronnie Chandler was not executed but was instead on of Clinton’s last-minute pardons after no small amount of political pressure was generated on his behalf.

Thanks Ray…it was starting to hurt!

Yes, “almost executed” doesn’t count. The other excuses I have seen given is that DNA evidence has overturned death penalty sentences. That would be an example of the system working.

That said, logically you can state that it is possible that an innocent was executed before we were capable of using DNA evidence. Even then, that would make an argument for not having the death penalty in the 60s, but it would not apply to today.

 

[rlg94086]

Yes.

There are a number of practical reasons put forward to oppose the death penalty: its cost, possible execution of innocent people, it is not applied fairly, etc, but since the OP asks about the moral nature of the death penalty I think it appropriate to limit the discussion to that aspect alone.

Punishment has four aims: retribution, rehabilitation, deterrence, and defense against the criminal. Of these, the primary one is retribution; that is, guilt calls for punishment. (2266) “the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.” The problem with the section in the catechism regarding the death penalty is that it addresses solely the issue of protection and ignores the need for the retribution that justice demands. I think at some point this section will have to be reworked.

Ender

Thanks Ender. Is there a Church document I can read regarding the four aims of punishment from a Church perspective? I would especially find one that specifically ties retribution to the valid use of the DP very helpful.

 

[Ender]

Thanks Ender. Is there a Church document I can read regarding the four aims of punishment from a Church perspective?

The best article I have read is this one by Cardinal Dulles. It is not a Church document but it is an excellent review of what the Church teaches on the subject.
firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=2175

Another useful document is the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (sections 402, 403) vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html

I would especially find one that specifically ties retribution to the valid use of the DP very helpful.

So would I; let me know if you find one.

Ender

 

[goofyjim]

The catechism is quite clear: “The traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude …recourse to the death penalty”. However many caveats may surround and limit its use, its use is sometimes permitted. The fact that it is permitted in even a single case means that it cannot be intrinsically evil as intrinsically evil acts (e.g. abortion) are never permitted in any situation. Given that the Vatican had the death penalty on her books until the mid 1960’s it really is impossible to argue that the Church defines capital punishment as intrinsically evil. Yes.

There are a number of practical reasons put forward to oppose the death penalty: its cost, possible execution of innocent people, it is not applied fairly, etc, but since the OP asks about the moral nature of the death penalty I think it appropriate to limit the discussion to that aspect alone.

Punishment has four aims: retribution, rehabilitation, deterrence, and defense against the criminal. Of these, the primary one is retribution; that is, guilt calls for punishment. (2266) “the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.” The problem with the section in the catechism regarding the death penalty is that it addresses solely the issue of protection and ignores the need for the retribution that justice demands. I think at some point this section will have to be reworked.

Ender

Well then I will have to disagree with the Catechism and the Vatican. I find the deathpenalty very anti life and therefore evil. But since opinions mean nothing I don’t care for anybody else’s either.

 

[Ender]

Well then I will have to disagree with the Catechism and the Vatican. I find the death penalty very anti life and therefore evil. But since opinions mean nothing I don’t care for anybody else’s either.

I distinguish between an opinion on a topic and an understanding of a topic. It’s like the difference between having an opinion on Hamlet and having an understanding of celestial mechanics. An opinion is a personal preference; it’s not something we would call right or wrong, but a student either understands physical laws or he doesn’t. Unlike opinions, an understanding is either correct or incorrect.

Regarding the death penalty, what I am trying to explain is my understanding of what the Church teaches, so I can be proven wrong if someone can offer a better interpretation of Church documents. I will accept whatever the Church teaches as doctrine.

Ender

 

[goofyjim]

I distinguish between an opinion on a topic and an understanding of a topic. It’s like the difference between having an opinion on Hamlet and having an understanding of celestial mechanics. An opinion is a personal preference; it’s not something we would call right or wrong, but a student either understands physical laws or he doesn’t. Unlike opinions, an understanding is either correct or incorrect.

Regarding the death penalty, what I am trying to explain is my understanding of what the Church teaches, so I can be proven wrong if someone can offer a better interpretation of Church documents. I will accept whatever the Church teaches as doctrine.

Ender

Church doctrine must be followed. If it’s doctrine that the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, that’s a doctrine I choose not to follow. If that makes me less of a Catholic so be it.

 

[rlg94086]

The best article I have read is this one by Cardinal Dulles. It is not a Church document but it is an excellent review of what the Church teaches on the subject.
firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=2175

An excellent article and very helpful. I have a lot of respect for Cardinal Dulles, so, while it may not be an infallible document, it holds a lot of weight with me. Besides that, I would be interested to see anyone shoot down his arguments.

Ender:

Another useful document is the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (sections 402, 403) vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html

A little less helpful IMO. 402 does explain the purpose of punishment, but I would not say that 403 helps…unless you read it in light of Cardinal Dulles’ explanation of the value of “salutary repentence.” Otherwise, it reads more like the arguments against the DP, by focussing on rehabilitation.

Ender:

So would I; let me know if you find one.

Ender

Indeed I will…sounds like it won’t happen, eh? However, given that there is no statement that rejects the DP outright either, I think it is acceptable to be of the mindset that the DP is allowed by the Church (that much is clear) and either be in favor of the DP or opposed to it as a Catholic. Both are valid positions, as long as people don’t shake their fingers at their fellow Catholics and tell them their positions are un-Catholic.

 

[Ray_Scheel]

Church doctrine must be followed. If it’s doctrine that the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, that’s a doctrine I choose not to follow. If that makes me less of a Catholic so be it.

In other words, “I don’t care what the truth is, I’m going to believe what I want” - the de facto slogan of dyed in the wool cafeteria Catholics.

It continues to amazes me as to what people are willing to announce to the whole world theses days, and amazes me even more when they act surprised that anyone who paid attention considers them to have no credibility…

 

[goofyjim]

In other words, “I don’t care what the truth is, I’m going to believe what I want” - the de facto slogan of dyed in the wool cafeteria Catholics.

It continues to amazes me as to what people are willing to announce to the whole world theses days, and amazes me even more when they act surprised that anyone who paid attention considers them to have no credibility…

I am free to consider the death penalty evil no matter what the Church dictates. I answer then to a higher power than the Church. It is not the same as the cafeteria Catholicism.

 

[Ray_Scheel]

I am free to consider the death penalty evil no matter what the Church dictates. I answer then to a higher power than the Church. It is not the same as the cafeteria Catholicism.

Strange. “That is between God and me” is something I hear rather often from those rejecting the position of the Church on using hormonal contraceptives, and it is hard to dispute that usage is anything but cafeteria Catholicism put into words. Picking and choosing is picking and choosing.

 

[LCMS_No_More]

Church doctrine must be followed. If it’s doctrine that the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, that’s a doctrine I choose not to follow. If that makes me less of a Catholic so be it.

I’d be careful about that. Here’s how I would look at it because I do agree that the death penalty is evil, just not intrinsically so. The Church teaches that the death penalty is permissible under certain circumstances. The Church also says that in modern societies, these circumstances are so rare as to be practically non-existent. Therefore, one is certainly free to oppose the death penalty.

 

[SoCalRC]

SoCalRC, if you happen to be personally against it, that’s fine. But please, just answer my painfully simple question.

The death penalty is not intrinsically evil. In the Catholic faith, few things are. Look at war, slavery, and infanticide.

We have a few teachings that are very near absolute, but even then the Church does not use the words “intrinsically evil”. For example, murder, direct euthanasia, and direct abortion are always “grave moral disorders”.

Our understanding is that acts can be good or bad depending on their context. Jesus gives us an example of this in the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). A man is beaten, robbed, and left for dead. A priest, seeing the man, crosses to the other side of the road and passes by. In modern eyes, we think of an unwillingness to help or get involved, ala’ the famous Kitty Genovese murder:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitty_Genovese

But given the context of the parable, a “scholar of the law” asking the question, one aspect we miss is that the priest was concerned with purity laws, which we can see in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. A priest would be rendered unclean by contact with a corpse. The priest and the levite where following the letter of one Biblical law at the expense of a higher one. The despised Samaritan answered the higher law.

I use this example, because you will often run into its equivelent in discussing the death penalty in a supposedly Catholic context. The simplest answer is to point you to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (#2266 and #2267). At that point, many people who want to pretend that the death penalty is not a clear teaching in our faith will parse the words and note that the text leaves room for the possiblility of the death penalty.

The first big problem with this is that the Catechism is a collected synopsis of Church teaching. Almost every numbered entry has referrences to other entires and almost every page has footnotes leadings to volumes of Church documents and many, many passages of Scripture. So people are essentially trying to split hairs on a ‘Cliff Notes’ summary.

If you bother to point this out to them, indicating, say, that the quote about the need for the death penalty being “practically non-existant” comes from a Papal Encyclical (EVANGELIUM VITAE), you run into the second big problem- - not only are they using the ‘cliff notes’, they are not even using all of them.

I’ve even heard the remarkably novel argument that the Pope has no authority to judge the application of the death penalty for the United States. That argument is actually beyond heresy, it is technically anathema (excommunication is seperation from the body of the faithful, anathema is seperation from the body of Christ):

“If anyone should say that the Roman Pontiff has merely the function of inspection or direction but not full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the whole Church, not only in matters pertaining to faith and morals… let him be anathema” - Dogmatic Constitution of the Church of Christ, #3

But even more importantly, it wholly ignores Part One of the Catechism, which elaborates on things we collectively profess to be true in the Nicene Creed each Mass. Even the ‘cliff notes’ explains that we are an Apostolic Church with a Gift of a Authority and a Heirarchy setup by God.

We have a USCCB in part, to directly address the need for interpretation in the context of local conditions. So when the USCCB calls for the end of the death penalty:

usccb.org/sdwp/national/deathpenalty/

It is the appropriate Church authority (empowered to act “in persona Christi Capitas” (CCC #875)). There are no rougue or dissenting factions, it is a “collegiate” entity of the Church (CCC #877). Their authority on the matter is clear (CCC #886 and #887) and expressly extended by the one Vicar of Christ (#881, #882, and #883).

The Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith Prefect has, in a letter, indicated that disagreement about the death penalty does not render one unfit for Holy Communion. But Church teaching remains clear, for Catholics the death penalty in the US is immoral. By Papal Authority, the gravity is closely akin to abortion (EVANGALIUM VITAE puts it in the same context as abortion, euthanasia, and murder).

There are Christian sects that argue that we should each interpret such things for ourselves. Catholicism is not one of them. You may recall that Pope Benedict approved a document last year reaffirming the Primacy of the Catholic Church - based principally on our apostolic nature:

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20070629_responsa-quaestiones_en.html

 

[Ender]

We have a few teachings that are very near absolute, but even then the Church does not use the words “intrinsically evil”. For example, murder, direct euthanasia, and direct abortion are always “grave moral disorders”.

An intrinsically evil act is one that is evil in all situations regardless of the circumstances or intent. Acts that are always wrong the Church defines as intrinsically evil - and they explicitly include murder, euthanasia, and abortion.

Our understanding is that acts can be good or bad depending on their context.

An intrinsically evil act is always evil regardless of the context.

… the Catechism is a collected synopsis of Church teaching. Almost every numbered entry has referrences to other entires and almost every page has footnotes leadings to volumes of Church documents and many, many passages of Scripture.

… the need for the death penalty being “practically non-existant” comes from a Papal Encyclical (EVANGELIUM VITAE)

If you actually look up the references you will discover that section 56 of Evangelium vitae quotes from section 2267 of the catechism and section 2267 quotes… section 56 of EV. They cite each other; neither of them references a single document in the 1995 years prior to EV to support this new position.

We have a USCCB in part, to directly address the need for interpretation in the context of local conditions. So when the USCCB calls for the end of the death penalty

The USCCB does call for the elimination of the death penalty but they also say they neither “judge nor condemn” anyone who holds a different position, a statement that would be inexplicable if they were discussing doctrine.

Ender

 

[dacoobob]

Ender:

An intrinsically evil act is always evil regardless of the context.

Exactly. Thus it’s obvious that execution isn’t intrinsically evil, since God Himself explicitly prescribes such in the Bible, many times. Well, that was easy. Case closed, right?

 

[Fred_4]

No.

 

[Ray_Scheel]

I’ve even heard the remarkably novel argument that the Pope has no authority to judge the application of the death penalty for the United States. That argument is actually beyond heresy, it is technically anathema (excommunication is seperation from the body of the faithful, anathema is seperation from the body of Christ)%between%

Such a judgment of heresy / technical anathema is possible only by formally rejecting the multiple instances in which the Church has formally recognized that the authority to protect the public good falls to the State and is not within the authority of the Church to decide which particular course of action the state must use (or not) within the allowable means. Use of the Death penalty is one of the explicitly stipulated allowable means. Having to commit heresy in order to claim another position is heresy makes for a rather weak argument to that claim…