The Catholic stance on the Death Penalty and...Comic Book Super Villains

[Dtmccameron]

Hello!

I would firstly like to apologize if this is the wrong place for this thread. The the issue I’m about to present is, in a way, serious, I didn’t think entirely enough so for the other boards.

Any how, the Catholic Church has a very defined stance against the death penalty, and if I could sum it up here, “Only in really extreme circumstance, for the protection of the community”.

Now, in the Western world, one criminal doesn’t really pose such a threat to the community as a whole once imprisioned as to justify his execution.

But there is one instance where individuals regularily escape from imprisonment and return to menace society. Comic books.

And I can’t help but wonder why, when such individuals pose such an obvious threat to society, when the prison walls have proven entirely incapable of containing them, why comic book societies (That is to say, the societies within comic books) refuse to execute them.

After all, had the Joker or Lex Luthor been executed for their crimes, it really would have saved the world a lot of trouble. Then again, we don’t execute people out of convenience. It would obviously be easier and less troube to execute every law braker and not bother with building prisions, feeding and clothing and guarding prisoners, but we aren’t out to do what is easy, rather what is right.

But it seems to me that not executing Super Villains is gross negligence on the nations of comic books’ parts.

My question: If Lex Luthor (or any super villain) did exist, would their execution be just? (NOT justifiable, but just)

Thank you for your time!

 

[JRPV]

I may not answer your question directly, except to give my opinion on the Church’s stance on the death penalty - executing Lex Luthor would not be just.

I would like to make a suggestion and give a comment.

My suggestion listening: I listened to lecture yesterday (you can find it on iTunes), given at Emory University with the cooperation of the Augustinian Institute I believe called The Catholic Church and the Death Penalty, where law and religion meet. The lecturer was given by Atlanta’s Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory.

My comment: I read in one of these forums yesterday a quote from Aquinas ( I believe), to paraphrase, if you don’t follow all of the gospel you love your self and not the gospel.

In the lecture I just referenced Antonin Scalia was paraphrased as saying that The Church’s new rules about the death penalty were against the traditional rules about the death penalty and so he was not obliged to follow the new rules. If he was obligated to follow it he would either have to quit being a Catholic or quit being a Supreme, and he was clear that he would quit being a Supreme.

I find this justification to be unconvincing given his positions, and I find it revealing with respect to the American conservative position about crime, punishment, justification and theological purity.

 

[JRPV]

And what do you make of this article I found? Law & Order did this topic recently.

ARTICLE

Can Religious Faith Justify Reckless Homicide? A Wisconsin Prosecution Raises Larger Issues
By SHERRY F. COLB
Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2009

In March of last year, an eleven-year-old girl died of untreated diabetes, while her parents prayed for her recovery and chose not to consult a medical professional. The medical consensus is that Madeline Kara Neumann (who was known by her middle name) probably took about a month to die – in terrible pain, wasting away to 65 pounds by the end – and that insulin and intravenous fluids would have saved her young life.

Prosecutors subsequently charged Kara’s parents with second-degree reckless homicide under Wisconsin law for failing to prevent her death. Last month, the judge in their case rejected the defense’s argument that the prosecution was violating the couple’s rights to religious freedom. As a matter of law, this ruling is uncontroversial. Yet the case raises the more difficult and broader question of how the law should treat anti-social behavior that is motivated by religious faith.

MY COMMENTARY: Were the parents actions just? Should they go to jail? For me, this stuff is where the rubber meets the road.

Parents should have religious freedom and Christian Scientists (I assume these people CS) can be pure in their thought and intention and should, and do, have the right to practice as they choose. But what of the child? Forget the pain and death for moment, under normal circumstances the the parents’ beliefs are imposed on the child and subject the child to wherever those beliefs lead. If it is true in normal circumstances, should it not be true in extraordinary circumstances such as this? In the end, that is when rights count, when things get tough.

Personally I believe the parents were wrong and the child was unjustly subjected to torture and death by adults who had no right whatever to subject another human being to torture and death – whatever their religious beliefs. Huh, so I guess I believe in the right of the individual over the right of the religious to practice however they choose. Now there is a revelation with untold implications.

 

[Feanor]

I find the general disagreement with the Church’s stance on this forum regarding capital punishment very troubling. It is their own “cafeteria Catholicism.” Their posts are more about anger and contempt, less about the value of life- even terribly mis-spent life

It is really about their marrying of the political Conservatism and the Faith.

Yes, Capital Punishment can be legitimate, even a duty of government- but not in our society.

I wonder how many of these posters have watched TV converage of the, in my opinion, entirely appropriate, and highly restrictive treatment of horrible homicidal killers in these “super-max” prisons. In many prisons- there is wirtually NO contact between prisoners and virtually NO contact between guards and these prisoners- except through very small holes when they are “cuffed up.”

I am all for even increased sentences on rapists and murderers but am very against the death penalty.

Yet they will justify, justify to fit their mindset- just as others in the Church justify their beliefs.

It is all about politics for them.

 

[grampben]

If life is valuable, it can’t loose its value. This is why euthanasia is wrong.
Killing is always an inherently wrong act, however in some situations it is necessary to prevent more death (and thus more ‘wrong’). But in Western society where murderers can be locked up, there is no need for the death penalty as if properly guarded they cannot kill anybody, and thus execution is not morally justifiable.

Do we execute people because it’s against the law or because it’s immoral?
If it is justifiable for legal reasons, and a law was made saying death penalty is OK for political opposition, one would have to accept that.
If it is justified not necessarily because of legal issues, but by moral issues, then surely everyone who commits mortal sin should be executed?

Killing is wrong. Putting someone to death is killing, even if the government does it.

 

[Arclight]

…

And I can’t help but wonder why, when such individuals pose such an obvious threat to society, when the prison walls have proven entirely incapable of containing them, why comic book societies (That is to say, the societies within comic books) refuse to execute them…

It would make for short story arcs and the characters (who develop quite a following of fanboys) couldn’t be reused 5 or 6 thousand times and in dozens of movies.

 

[Watchman]

My question: If Lex Luthor (or any super villain) did exist, would their execution be just? (NOT justifiable, but just)

Thank you for your time!

That depends, I believe, on whether there also existed a Superman or other proportionately powered superhero sufficiently skilled and capable of keeping such a vile villain in check. If the arch villain’s attacks were continually and unfailingly thwarted by an equally or greater-powered protector of the populace, there would be no need to resort to capitol punishment.

Of course, it’s not only a society’s will, but also their ability to execute an irredeemable super-villain that figures into the equation as well. Any society incapable of restraining such a notorious ne’er-do-well may find themselves impotent, too, in bringing about the savage scofflaw’s death.

Throw into the mix the possibility that the cunning criminal has secreted in his tights a noxious nuclear neurotoxin of alien origin and all bets are off.

Up and away,
Watchman

 

[Dtmccameron]

That depends, I believe, on whether there also existed a Superman or other proportionately powered superhero sufficiently skilled and capable of keeping such a vile villain in check. If the arch villain’s attacks were continually and unfailingly thwarted by an equally or greater-powered protector of the populace, there would be no need to resort to capitol punishment…

Up and away,
Watchman

But before the villains are ever thwarted, they first unleash untold havoc on the populace. Which is where their principle threat arises from. After all, if Superman could apprehend Lex before he enacts any of his schemes, I doub’t there would be a problem. But the fact of the matter is, Super Villains are not always prevented from causing chaos and mayhem, and are always a threat to society.

And the only reason I mention Lex Luthor instead of certain other, much harder to kill Villains is because he is, so far as I know, for all intents and purposes, merely human. And I’m quite certain that in universes with gigantic robots and flying men, and villains which always escape, the people could, if the writer willed them to do so, figure out a way to finish off these bad guys.

I also invite you fellows to remember these are characters, not human beings. They are evil, and always have been (save certain instances of exposition) and always will be.

Feanor, grampben, I understand your points entirely and agree wholeheartedly, but as we’re dealing with supervillains, which can never be held indefinately by any prison, and always return to menace society (perhaps what seperates them from mere criminals), by your (grampben) logic (and I apologize if I misuse it) it would be justifiable to execute them. Said killing by the state would still be murder, and wrong, but it was “neccessary”. But then, a neccessary evil is nonetheless an evil, and a state which perpetrates evil, even in its own defence is an evil one, no? But perhaps executions are in a way, a sort of “Just War”, well, against super villains, anyway.



I don’t seek to disagree with or change the Church, merely to come to greater understanding.

Arclight, I think you hit the nail on the head, though. I asked my father what he though of the question, and he suggested they stop writing the characters in.

Ah, well. 'Tis naught but a fantasy, after all.

I thank you all for your responses and comments!

 

[survive]

I believe we can execute someone who otherwise would be an uncontrollable threat to others’ lives, as is the case with so many supervillains. I don’t know how to execute them though. Some regenerate and some shapeshift, so we might have them among us as we type.:manvspc:

 

[centurionguard]

If life is valuable, it can’t loose its value. This is why euthanasia is wrong.
Killing is always an inherently wrong act, however in some situations it is necessary to prevent more death (and thus more ‘wrong’). But in Western society where murderers can be locked up, there is no need for the death penalty as if properly guarded they cannot kill anybody, and thus execution is not morally justifiable.

Do we execute people because it’s against the law or because it’s immoral?
If it is justifiable for legal reasons, and a law was made saying death penalty is OK for political opposition, one would have to accept that.
If it is justified not necessarily because of legal issues, but by moral issues, then surely everyone who commits mortal sin should be executed?

Killing is wrong. Putting someone to death is killing, even if the government does it.

Denver, Colo., Oct 19, 2005 / 12:00 am (CNA).- In his most recent column in the Denver Catholic Register, Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput clarified the Catholic Church’s oft misunderstood teaching on the death penalty, saying that in almost all cases today, it goes beyond necessity, and into undignified excess.

He compared the Church’s teaching on the death penalty to that on acts like abortion, genocide and euthanasia, saying that in the comparison, there is an inequality.

“The death penalty”, he wrote, “is not intrinsically evil [like abortion and euthanasia are]. Both Scripture and long Christian tradition acknowledge the legitimacy of capital punishment under certain circumstances. The Church cannot repudiate that without repudiating her own identity.”

“Catholic teaching on euthanasia, the death penalty, war, genocide and abortion”, the archbishop said, “are rooted in the same concern for the sanctity of the human person. But these different issues do not all have the same gravity or moral content. They are not equivalent.”

He used war as an applicable example, noting that there are cases in which acts of war are morally legitimate–similar to the death penalty.

However, he pointed out, what the Church’s teaching on the death penalty involves is, “a call to set aside unnecessary violence, including violence by the state, in the name of human dignity and building a culture of life.”

“In the wake of the bloodiest century in history,” Archbishop Chaput said, “the Church invites us to recover our own humanity by choosing God’s higher road of restraint and mercy instead of state-sanctioned killing that implicates all of us as citizens.”

He cited the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that if “non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor *, authority [should] 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” (2267).

Likewise, he quoted John Paul II, who points out in his Gospel of Life, that “the nature and extent of the punishment [for capital crimes] must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not to go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity; in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society.”

The late Pope noted that “today however, as a result of steady improvements to the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.”

The Archbishop stressed that “In modern industrialized states, killing convicted murderers adds nothing to anyone’s safety. It is an excess.”

He said that “for John Paul II, the punishment of any crime should not only seek to redress wrong and protect society. It should also encourage the possibility of repentance, restitution and rehabilitation on the part of the criminal. Execution removes that hope.”

As the Church recognizes Respect Life Month, being celebrated throughout October, Archbishop Chaput ended his piece with strong words: “Choosing against the death penalty is choosing in favor of life.”

“We need to end the death penalty,” he said, “and we need to do it soon.”*

 

[Feanor]

Denver, Colo., Oct 19, 2005 / 12:00 am (CNA).- In his most recent column in the Denver Catholic Register, Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput clarified the Catholic Church’s oft misunderstood teaching on the death penalty, saying that in almost all cases today, it goes beyond necessity, and into undignified excess.

He compared the Church’s teaching on the death penalty to that on acts like abortion, genocide and euthanasia, saying that in the comparison, there is an inequality.

“The death penalty”, he wrote, “is not intrinsically evil [like abortion and euthanasia are]. Both Scripture and long Christian tradition acknowledge the legitimacy of capital punishment under certain circumstances. The Church cannot repudiate that without repudiating her own identity.”

“Catholic teaching on euthanasia, the death penalty, war, genocide and abortion”, the archbishop said, “are rooted in the same concern for the sanctity of the human person. But these different issues do not all have the same gravity or moral content. They are not equivalent.”

He used war as an applicable example, noting that there are cases in which acts of war are morally legitimate–similar to the death penalty.

However, he pointed out, what the Church’s teaching on the death penalty involves is, “a call to set aside unnecessary violence, including violence by the state, in the name of human dignity and building a culture of life.”

“In the wake of the bloodiest century in history,” Archbishop Chaput said, “the Church invites us to recover our own humanity by choosing God’s higher road of restraint and mercy instead of state-sanctioned killing that implicates all of us as citizens.”

He cited the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that if “non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor *, authority [should] 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” (2267).

Likewise, he quoted John Paul II, who points out in his Gospel of Life, that “the nature and extent of the punishment [for capital crimes] must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not to go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity; in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society.”

The late Pope noted that “today however, as a result of steady improvements to the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.”

The Archbishop stressed that “In modern industrialized states, killing convicted murderers adds nothing to anyone’s safety. It is an excess.”

He said that “for John Paul II, the punishment of any crime should not only seek to redress wrong and protect society. It should also encourage the possibility of repentance, restitution and rehabilitation on the part of the criminal. Execution removes that hope.”

As the Church recognizes Respect Life Month, being celebrated throughout October, Archbishop Chaput ended his piece with strong words: “Choosing against the death penalty is choosing in favor of life.”

“We need to end the death penalty,” he said, “and we need to do it soon.”*

Excellent post!

Archbishop Chaput has provided a well balanced and clear defense of the Church’s teaching regarding Capital Punishment.