Virginia bishops urge Catholics to shift focus of death penalty debate

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The bishops would do well to talk about how Catholics allow mothers to impose the death penalty onto their unborn children every time they vote “Pro Choice.”
 
polki said:
The bishops would do well to talk about how Catholics allow mothers to impose the death penalty onto their unborn children every time they vote “Pro Choice.”
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The bishops address abortion frequently. To my knowledge none have voted pro abortion.
 
adrift said:
I am sure this makes perfect sense to you but it is confusing to me. The morality of capital punishment has been dealt with by the Church, your designation of “our age” seems to indicate that morality is redefined with the ages. If this is what you are saying, it is not a true statement. The Church has stated and has not changed the position that capital punishment is moral. The only development is should it be used.
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Taken properly in the context that the Church has always dealt with capital punishment ie. as a subsection of the fifth Commandment ‘Thou shall not kill’, implies that the killing of a person comes with conditions. The Church has never said that capital punishment is moral in and of itself. It’s moral under legitimate conditions. It’s like saying that sacking employees is moral or smacking your child is moral or missing Mass on Sunday is moral etc. The gold standard is that employees must be fair to staff and children must be loved and Mass is a serious obligation.

The gold standard is ‘Thou shall not kill’. Capital punishment is moral in relation to how it serves the common good. It is not the gold standard of divine and human law.
 
LongingSoul said:
It was your offensive post (which was subsequently deleted) about the hierarchy of the Catholic Church being ignorant and theologically mistaken which set the tone of the thread. It is your dismissal of the authority of the Church in every one of these threads that sets the tone.
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I said before that this was an incorrect description of my post, and now I am able to demonstrate it. I appealed to the moderator and he restored the post (#3). Here it is in its entirety.The claim of 152 people on death row being exonerated is demonstrably untrue, and those who fabricated it know it, but those who repeat it in all probability do not. I think this is a case of carelessness on the part of the bishops rather than outright deceit. They oppose the use of capital punishment and have accepted the dishonest claims of other opponents at face value. It reflects poorly on them but I believe they were misled themselves rather than that they were deliberately trying to mislead others.
Now, point to where I said the hierarchy of the church was “theologically mistaken.” Point to the part that dismisses the authority of the church. That is: prove your charge or retract it.

Ender
 
Ender said:
I’ll challenge you just like I did LongingSoul: prove your slander or retract it. Highlight any statement I’ve made that you think demonstrates cherry-picking - and define what you think cherry-picking is.
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Sirach2: I’m still waiting to hear from you. You charged me with cherry-picking, that is, with behaving deceitfully. Where is your evidence? Are you even going to try to defend the charge, and if not, how about admitting that you spoke in haste?

Ender
 
pnewton said:
I did not charge you with deception. My post is still there for comparison.
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Here is your post:*this assertion attributed to Cardinal Dulles is that Church doctrine is not doctrine. I believe this to be a case where a statement is taken out of context, that is proof-texted *
What I cited Dulles as saying was that the new teaching on capital punishment was prudential (not that doctrine wasn’t doctrine); this was what you called proof-texting. What is proof-texting but taking words out of context to prove a point that cannot be sustained by the full text itself? Using an argument one knows to be false is deceitful; that’s what proof-texting is. None of your other citations matter with regard to the question of whether my citation accurately reflected Dulles’ own position. Where is the evidence that I distorted Dulles’ comments on the prudential nature of this teaching?

Ender
 
Wait.
Is this a thread about the Virginia Bishops and the Death Penalty or a personal fight?
I think calling people out is against the rules…but hey, I could be wrong. :compcoff:
People disagree.
OK, I got it.
Can we move on?
I’m sure oodles of people are reading and getting a good perspective from the various quotes. Can we just leave it at that?
:twocents:
 
Sirach2 said:
Just as an aside, people seldom realize the implications of a life sentence in prison. IMO, it is a far worse fate than the death penalty. After reading Mr. Morton’s book about the horrors of life in prison, that would be a more just sentence to impose. It is not a cake walk in the park, by any means, and there is no escape, as is possible through a death sentence.
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Are you saying that the death penalty is an act of mercy, then?
I think that imposition of the ultimate penalty upon those who have unjustly taken another’s life shows RESPECT for the culture of life. Opposition to the death penalty by hard-core abortion proponents helps them salve their tortured consciences. There is no evidence that a hardened heart softens when a wanton killer’s life is spared. :rolleyes: Rob
 
Ender said:
I said before that this was an incorrect description of my post, and now I am able to demonstrate it. I appealed to the moderator and he restored the post (#3). Here it is in its entirety.The claim of 152 people on death row being exonerated is demonstrably untrue, and those who fabricated it know it, but those who repeat it in all probability do not. I think this is a case of carelessness on the part of the bishops rather than outright deceit. They oppose the use of capital punishment and have accepted the dishonest claims of other opponents at face value. It reflects poorly on them but I believe they were misled themselves rather than that they were deliberately trying to mislead others.
Now, point to where I said the hierarchy of the church was “theologically mistaken.” Point to the part that dismisses the authority of the church. That is: prove your charge or retract it.

Ender
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In my experienced opinion of your tactics over many years, you deliberately derailed the thread from the get go by trying to discredit the Virginia bishops, who speak completely in line with the Magisterium… by accusing them of carelessness. The valid supporting evidence of exonerated inmates, was of no consequence to the topic other than as one piece of evidence produced to support the Bishops theologically sound position of abandoning the death penalty in the light of today’s conditions.

In post 34 you go onto use this proposed premise to further undermine the Bishops role in teaching Church doctrine.

“The opinions of individual bishops do not represent church teaching. Do you really not understand this?”

(And add for good measure one of your kickers)

The Bishops are stating a position that accords with the mind of the Church and 2000 years of teaching. My original post does not represent an ‘opinion’ and a careless one at that… of individual Bishops. You are dishonest and it’s plain to see the error in your own arguments lie in what Pope Francis referred to as intellectual narcissism.
 
MODERATOR WARNING

Please stop the arguments, post charitably, discuss the issues, not each other.

Stay on the topic of the original post
 
Many US bishops seemed to have voted for Obama in the 2008 and 2012 elections according to the bishop of Rhode Island Tobin. In the article below Bishop Tobin implies that he voted for Obama in 2008 since he supported the Democrat party.
lifesitenews.com/news/bishop-reveals-he-changed-party-registration-from-democrat-to-republican-ov
“The bishops address abortion frequently. To my knowledge none have voted pro abortion.”

The death penalty is morally licit and will remain so. Pope Francis, nor the bishops can change the Church teaching on this. It is of course fine to call for other means or for less use of it.
The Albigensian heretics in the 13th century taught that the state had no right to execute criminals. If an Albigensian wished to be readmitted to the Catholic Church, the penitent had to swear among other things that the state had the right to execute criminals.
There was just a break out of dangerous murderers in NY. Society was not protected from them by mere imprisonment.
 
FRLBJ said:
Many US bishops seemed to have voted for Obama in the 2008 and 2012 elections according to the bishop of Rhode Island Tobin. In the article below Bishop Tobin implies that he voted for Obama in 2008 since he supported the Democrat party.
lifesitenews.com/news/bishop-reveals-he-changed-party-registration-from-democrat-to-republican-ov
“The bishops address abortion frequently. To my knowledge none have voted pro abortion.”

The death penalty is morally licit and will remain so. Pope Francis, nor the bishops can change the Church teaching on this. It is of course fine to call for other means or for less use of it.
The Albigensian heretics in the 13th century taught that the state had no right to execute criminals. If an Albigensian wished to be readmitted to the Catholic Church, the penitent had to swear among other things that the state had the right to execute criminals.
There was just a break out of dangerous murderers in NY. Society was not protected from them by mere imprisonment.
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Great point! In NE Pa, we have had killers murder again while in prison. Is this fair to the guy who loses his life while being incarcerated for theft or a bar fight?
BTW, wait until we see the list of pardons at the end of Barack’s term. I think some of his supporters will be in shock. I hope not. :cool:
 
FRLBJ said:
The Albigensian heretics in the 13th century taught that the state had no right to execute criminals. If an Albigensian wished to be readmitted to the Catholic Church,…
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And Nazis executed people. So what? This is not the 13th Century. The Albigensian heresy was *not *thinking we did not need a death penalty.

And the death penalty can be immoral. ISIS is an example today of an illicit death penalty. Again, what bishop has stated that the death penalty, which can be morally licit, is still morally licit today?
 
pnewton said:
And Nazis executed people. So what? This is not the 13th Century. The Albigensian heresy was *not *thinking we did not need a death penalty.

And the death penalty can be immoral. ISIS is an example today of an illicit death penalty. Again, what bishop has stated that the death penalty, which can be morally licit, is still morally licit today?
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The death penalty as you note is not intrinsically evil. It’s use may be evil it also may be good. Your question is what bishop believes it can still be morally licit today? That is simple to answer all of them do. If it was moral in the time of the Old Testament, if it was moral 2000 years ago, if it was moral two hundred years ago, if it was moral 100 years ago it MUST be moral still. Situation ethics does not apply. The question isn’t if it is moral but when it should be used the Catholic Church says rare if not practically non existant but it does not say that it is morally illicit. It is very debatable if the conditions set can be met. Is it true that we have the means to protect without killing? In most cases, I believe it is possible. I don’t believe it is as rare as the Bishops believe it is. Who would have thought a prisoner could cut his way out of prison? It still bothers me that the word “today” is used. Why just today are we capable of rendering a murderer harmless in prison?
 
FRLBJ said:
Many US bishops seemed to have voted for Obama in the 2008 and 2012 elections according to the bishop of Rhode Island Tobin. In the article below Bishop Tobin implies that he voted for Obama in 2008 since he supported the Democrat party.
lifesitenews.com/news/bishop-reveals-he-changed-party-registration-from-democrat-to-republican-ov
“The bishops address abortion frequently. To my knowledge none have voted pro abortion.”

I think a lot of people would be surprised at how many bishops are essentially registered democrats. I think at least a third are solid democrat supporters. People complain about there being no catholic voting block but when the situation is even if the bishops were the only ones voting than the elections would still be divided and close.
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adrift said:
T Situation ethics does not apply. The question isn’t if it is moral but when it should be used the Catholic Church says rare if not practically non existant but it does not say that it is morally illicit. It is very debatable if the conditions set can be met. Is it true that we have the means to protect without killing? In most cases, I believe it is possible. I don’t believe it is as rare as the Bishops believe it is. Who would have thought a prisoner could cut his way out of prison? It still bothers me that the word “today” is used. Why just today are we capable of rendering a murderer harmless in prison?
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I cannot agree it is always moral. I will say it is never intrinsically evil though. As to whether we can keep people safely, or be sure of convicts, such questions are why the bishop here is suggesting we shift the focus on the intrinsic value of life in this culture of death. Those questions then become moot.
 
pnewton said:
I cannot agree it is always moral. I will say it is never intrinsically evil though. As to whether we can keep people safely, or be sure of convicts, such questions are why the bishop here is suggesting we shift the focus on the intrinsic value of life in this culture of death. Those questions then become moot.
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Shlifiting the focus to the value of life protects us from those who do not value it How?
  1. Capital punishement is neutral being neither good or bad.
  2. The use of capital punishment may be moral or immoral.
The Church states that if there is no doubt about the guilt and there are not other means than it is moral to use. The Church has always maintained the right of the state to use the death penalty. This has been the constant teaching. There is a myriad of good reasons not to use the death penalty but to deny that government does not have the right is not one of them.
 
adrift said:
Shlifiting the focus to the value of life protects us from those who do not value it How?
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I did not say that we are better protected from those who do not value life. That is not the point of the article.
 
pnewton said:
I did not say that we are better protected from those who do not value life. That is not the point of the article.
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No you didn’t say this out right but then what did you mean
such questions are why the bishop here is suggesting we shift the focus on the intrinsic value of life in this culture of death.Those questions then become moot
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