The general approach the Church asks of us in weighing her teaching is “docility”. This is not a word that sits well with most of us, because it calls to mind images of sheep quietly going to be slaughtered, uttering not a peep of protest or independent thought. It is from poor notions of docility that you get stories of people who sat on their hands when they knew about priestly abuse, or bizarre notions that if the Pope says black is white then faithful Catholics must deny the evidence of their senses and say the same. That is not what the Church means by docility, of course, but it is what many people think docility means.
In fact, docility means something much more like “being willing to give the Church the benefit of the doubt and trying to think with her”. But in our kneejerk age of ideological reaction, this is often extremely difficult, particularly when the Church touches close to something that is very important to our tribal group. So, for instance, many people on the Left have a very difficult time sitting still to listen to the Church’s quite nuanced and sympathetic approach to the question of homosexuality. No sooner does the technical language of “intrinsically disordered” get spoken than the shouting begins: “Who are you calling ‘disordered’?” (as though the Church is offering a medical diagnosis). Nobody is interested in trying to understand what the Church is actually saying because they are too invested in shouting her down.
I wish I could say this is only an issue for the Pelvic Left, but it is also often the case for the Death Penalty Right too. I remarked the other day that those who advocate the use of the death penalty beyond the absolute bare minimum times when it is truly necessary (meaning, in First World Countries, basically never) are, in fact, dissenting from the guidance of the Church. I noted that such dissent is like dissent from the Church on artificial contraception.
A reader repied:
Those who do not agree with abolishing the death penalty are not dissenters, despite your insistence in proclaiming so. You are not the CDF. The CDF says those who differ on their opinion on this matter are not dissenters. Quit misleading fellow Catholics and admit you were wrong when you proclaimed, “So the Magisterium–that would be the teaching office of the Church founded by Jesus Christ to conserve and articulate the Tradition–urges minimal use of the death penalty with an eye toward abolishing wherever possible. That is the teaching of the Church and those who are at war with this teaching are, in fact, dissenting Catholic every bit as much as those who are at war with the Church’s teaching on contraception.” That statement is untrue, and if you insist on sticking to that statement then you are the one making claims that Church herself has never made. Contraception deals with an intrinsic evil which goes against the natural law. This is not the same with capital punishment. The CDF said so.
This means that 1. You do not understand the faith as you claim and therefore have made an error and have mislead people into believing something the Church has never taught, or 2. You do understand that you have gone beyond Church teaching and yet insist on misleading people by your private proclamation. Which is it going to be?
There are a number of things to note here. The first is the misunderstanding of what “dissent” means. My reader seems to think that “dissent” means disagreement the Church on matters of grave and intrinsic immorality, like abortion or contraception. But in fact, “dissent” means “disgreement with the Church on any matter of faith or morals”. If the Church says, “Modesty is good and immodesty is sinful” and you dissent from this, you are a dissenter on a matter of morals. If you differ from what some cleric happens to think about how to apply this teaching, you are not necessarily a dissenter at all. So, we are bound to agree about the Church’s general teaching on modesty, but not necessarily with how that might be applied. The Council of Trent, drawing on a sound principle of Catholic moral teaching about modesty, decided to (foolishly) apply a strict interpretation of it to Michaelangelo’s “Last Judgment” and order that clothes be painted on to some of the figures. Catholics who actually know about art should have been consulted and a Catholic who rolls his eyes at this dumb application is not “dissenting” but merely has a different prudential idea about what is and is not immodest.
Similar thing obtain regarding the death penalty. The Church teaches this:
In any event, the principle set forth in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church remains valid: “If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person”. Evangelium Vitae 56
To reject that by, say, advocating that we need to execute as many capital criminals as we can, is to dissent from Church teaching concerning the question of whether public authority must limit itself to bloodless means of punishment as much as possible.
Now there are two separate issues at work here.
The first is whether the Magisterium has the competence to develop the Church’s teaching to restrict the death penalty to absolute necessity. If you disagree with that, you are dissenting from Church teaching.
The second is about whether the Magisterium can err in the question of whether it is really technologically possible to find bloodless ways to keep prisoners from killing again. If you say that, you are not in dissent and you may, in fact, be doing the Church a favor by informing her teachers of information outside their field of competence. Of course, that assumes you know what you are talking about and not just making up rubbish to support your belief in the death penalty. The point is, being a bishop or a pope does not grant somebody magical understanding of corrections facilities any more than it grants him a degree in art appreciation.
With respect to the first question, the answer is obvious: the Magisterium has the competence to develop the Tradition. That’s the Magisterium’s job: to conserve and develop the Tradition. That means that Some Guy with a Keyboard cannot trump the Church’s developed teaching by appeals to earlier articulations of Church teaching, as though such teaching is capable of overturning the developed teaching, or as though JPII and the present Magisterium are guilty of a coup d’etat against some previous “real” Magisterium preferred by the Guy with a Keyboard. We cannot posit a theory that the present Magisterium is not the Magisterium of the Church. Because that is, in the final analysis, to posit that the Church has split into two Churches: pre- and post- Vatican II and that one of these two Churches trumps the other (a favorite trope among both Reactionary *and* Progressive Dissenters).
Split Church ecclesiology is not Catholic ecclesiology. I do not believe in a discontinuous post-Vatican II Church that destroyed and replaced the pre-Vatican II Church. So I do not believe that the Magisterium’s move to limit the death penalty to absolute bare necessity is a “revolution” but that it is rather a perfectly understandable development of the Church’s teaching on human dignity, applied to a world that is all too ready to kill and destroy human dignity. One cannot argue that the Church is not competent to say that “If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means”. She has every right to make that moral and prudent call. Our first duty as Catholics is to be docile to that teaching, not to perpetually look for loopholes. Kneejerk claims that the Church is “contradicting herself” seem to me to be analogous to kneejerk claims by first century Judaizers that the Church was “contradicting” Moses and the prophets by no longer binding members to keeping kosher, being circumcised, or wearing special clothing. Precisely what the Magisterium does is not just conserve, but develop the Tradition. The Magisterium, in the case of the death penalty, conserves both the Church’s teaching on the dignity of the human person and the state’s authority to inflict the death penalty (in theory). However, in obedience to the fact that the law was made for man and not man for the law, the Church concludes that it is better to let the capital criminal live in hope of his redemption than to sacrifice him to a legal theory of retributive justice—particularly in an era where Caesar has proven himself eager to kill millions. Death Penalty advocates are, at the end of the day, faced with the fact that the Church speaks in the imperative here: “If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means”.
Some will attempt to cite then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s remarks from a private letter as a sort of trump card to all this, trying to turn those remarks into a complete license to feel free to ignore everything the Church says about the death penalty:
Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. 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.
I agree with every word he says. That’s because what he says is not, “...and so we can safely conclude that John Paul II does not have the competence to say, ‘It is clear that [punishment] ought not 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.’” Rather, Ratzinger says that you can disagree about when it is prudent and practical to apply the death penalty. You cannot disagree on the Pope’s insistence that bloodless means should be sought wherever possible. That’s because the former question is a matter of legitimate diversity while the latter is a statement of developed doctrine to which we are bound to assent.
In short, the notion that there can be legitimate diversity of opinion touching the death penalty is not the same as the notion that all diversity of opinion touching the death penalty is ipso facto legitimate. The same holds true in many other areas. The Church teaches, for instance, that there is legitimate diversity of opinion on the pastoral care of homosexual persons. It does not follow from this that there is legitimate diversity of opinion on whether homosexual persons can engage in homosexual relations.
Tom Kreitzberg hits this radically defective “Cdl. Ratzinger says its okay to ignore teaching on the Death Penalty” reading on the head when he points out:
There is a prudential judgment expressed in EV, and repeated in the CCC, to which Catholics are not bound.
But there is also a doctrinal teaching: “It is clear that [punishment] ought not 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 failure to distinguish the doctrine from its conditional application has caused a lot of people to reject a doctrine proposed to the faithful in a papal encyclical.
And the idea that the Secretary of the CDF was suggesting (even in a private letter that has absolutely no doctrinal weight) that Catholics are free to ignore a papal teaching is untenable.
This brings us to the second issue: “But,” says an honest DP supporter, “the Church’s teaching is predicated on an ‘if’. “If bloodless means are sufficient…” True enough. One can, of course, argue from some specialized knowledge one may possess that we do not have the technical capacity to make minimization or abolition of the death penalty feasible. One may, for instance, be a corrections facilities officer who can attest to the technological impossibility of keeping innocents safe without the death penalty (specialized knowledge I highly doubt the average comboxer who dissents from Church teaching on the Death penalty possesses). Should such watertight arguments emerge for the technological (not the moral) impossibility of abolishing the death penalty, then the Church would, of course be obliged to acknowledge that bloodless means do not exist and the lack of an “If” trigger could then be cited by Catholics as mitigating against the abolition of the death penalty.
But given that the death penalty is safely abolished and replaced by bloodless means of punishment in many parts of the world (while it is maintained with zeal primarily in such models of regard for human dignity as China, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia—as well as here the US) it’s a tough sell to say that it is utterly impossible to find bloodless means to deal with grave criminals. It’s done every day. And therefore Catholics who aim to be docile to the Church’s teaching are, I think, compelled to confront and assent to the teaching laid out before us, not merely by two Popes, but by virtually all the bishops in the world. Whether the death penalty is intrinsically immoral has nothing to do with the question of whether we should obey the Church’s call to minimize and, where possible, abolish it. We are not called by Christ to be docile Holy Church only when Simon Peter Says in an ex cathedra statement. We are called to be docile to Holy Church.
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For any number of reasons, one can agree that state-sponsored executions ought at minimum, even to the point of never inflicting them, make serious people uneasy.
And yet many arguments against its use, qua arguments, leave the sense of something hollow at their core: including, perhaps, the broad ones Mr. Shea makes above.
The hollowness may be the failure more fully to explore the metaphysical implications of what the Catechism teaches. One such argument is that certain crimes have about them such a monstrous character, that failure to inflict death also means, precisely for metaphysical reasons, failure “to protect public order.”
The above argument hardly settles the question, is not meant to provoke semantic gimmickry & in no way justifies Texas governors or their partisans smirking at pleas for mercy; but neither is the matter solely one of whether inmates can find ways to kill the guards.
And it may mean the Church’s formal teaching upholds the principle of state-sponsored execution far more broadly than Mr. Shea’s article above allows.
Or not. The hope is that despite the cacophony the subject provokes, Mr. Shea’s good Catholic mind will struggle with the metaphysical impact on public order when a deeply unjust state (as all are) inflicts death on, say, a Dick Cheney, or Ruth Ginsburg, or the mutilating murderer of a child.
As with the impact on that order when said state pronounces, either in se or because while itself unworthy to legally execute, is worthy enough to decide, that such men & women as these remain, despite their crimes, free to live.
Or rather, for perhaps a syntactically preferable conclusion:
As with the impact on that order when said state pronounces - either in se or because while it considers itself unworthy legally to execute, holds itself worthy to decide - that such men & women as these remain, despite their crimes, free to live.
If the decision for or against the death penalty is to be based, in any way, on the gravity of the crime, then the death penalty is no longer chosen simply to “protect public order or the safety of persons”, which seems to be the only accepted reason granted by the Church. The death penalty becomes punishment, or vengeance, which is a totally different ball game. Maybe I could be stoned to death for advancing this, but no matter the way someone dies, even through absolutely horrible crimes, this person is then allowed to be taken up to meet his or her Creator and to enjoy eternal life. It is the same as if that person just died after a terrible battle with a very painful illness such as cancer. One day, we are all called to “return Home”, and then it is only God’s Mercy and the state of our own soul that will be important. When Jesus mentioned as a work of mercy, “I was in prison and you did (or did not) visit me”, He did not limit this to visiting prisoners who were non-violent or even innocent, He said “all” prisoners, including murderers. And, as Mark wrote elsewhere, what if He said “I was in prison and you were thirsting for my blood”? In the end, as our Creed says, we will all come back in our resurrected bodies, both the criminal and his victim(s).
We need to end the death penalty! Murder is never justice. Innocents have surely been executed in the past and will be in the future. It is just flawed public policy. Sending inmates to death row even costs more than imposing life sentences. Kill Capital Punishment!! More commentary and coverage at http://spatialorientation.com/tag/death-penalty/
M. Lepine:
Maybe. And no caveat as to the value of the prisoner’s soul, or the importance to our own as they relate to that soul.
But for society, through the state, to proclaim that certain crimes by virtue of their gravity will deprive their perpetrator’s right to live can arguably be understood as something more than mere vengeance or even punishment. Simply declaring it but vengeance does not necessarily make it so.
Without knowing the depth of the historical & theological arguments, my impression is nonetheless that the Church long held state executions legitimate precisely for the sake of the living; by analogy, like burying suicides in an unmarked grave, that the living would better understand the gravity, the metaphysical gravity, of that gravest of sins.
And thus that a severe public response to lesser but still grave crimes, due to their metaphysical impact on public order, may also be legitimate.
If I am right that the Church has historically held something akin to this view, then by virtue of ‘public order’ in the present magisterial teaching, it seems possible She still does.
I don’t insist this is true, but propose it may be, & in any event that its metaphysical aspect needs more fully to be addressed.
With apologies, my own sense is that your post is a beginning, but not of itself an adequate conclusion to the questions raised.
I propose such, in passim, as no fan of state executions, very particularly in light of our growing leviathan age. But the principles involved, to repeat, seem in need of much greater clarity.
Setting aside the moral issue of protecting society from capital offenders, why should a capital offender be given “mercy;” i.e., life in prison so that he or she may have time to “repent and be saved” when, by their horrible action(s) they may have sent their victims to Hell? Certainly, not every victim was in a state of grace such that when murdered they would be able to go the heaven. And certainly, many murdered people didn’t realize they were going to be murdered that day, or moment and either didn’t have time to repent for their mortal sins, or were too scared at the time to even think of repenting. Why should those murdered victims be “serving” time in Hell while the murderer is being served food in a clean, warm cell while watching television or reading a letter from a loved one, or a good book?
Perhaps when the Magisterium some how comes up with a way to absolve the sins of murdered victims, allowing them to be removed from Hell and enter Heaven, or reduces their time in Purgatory, I’ll be more opened to the concerns of a convicted capital offender. But in the meantime, I’m satisfied believing that punishment reduces capital crimes, especially the punishment of death. Perhaps some state should test whether my belief is justified or not by proposing a law that all murders committed on even numbered days get life in prison, and those committed on odd numbered days are executed. Do you think more murders will occur on even numbered days?
And as for those who have concerns of innocent people having been executed for a capital crime, if that were true, we would have heard about it by now from those legal anti-death penalty activists organizations. Yes, people on death row have been found later to be innocent of the crime that put them their, but no one who has been executed has been found to have been innocent.
And here’s a fact: Less than 3% of all captial offenders found guilty in the U.S. receive the death sentence.
Simply to correct a mild misunderstanding:
“The Council of Trent, drawing on a sound principle of Catholic moral teaching about modesty, decided to (foolishly) apply a strict interpretation of it to Michaelangelo’s “Last Judgment” and order that clothes be painted on to some of the figures. Catholics who actually know about art should have been consulted and a Catholic who rolls his eyes at this dumb application is not “dissenting” but merely has a different prudential idea about what is and is not immodest.
The problem was [and is] whether fully to display Our Lord’s genitalia and in what state. [Leo Steinberg RIP] discusses this thoroughly in THE SEXUALITY OF CHRIST…”].
It is neither “foolish” nor stupid [“dumb”]. Dante referred to Satan encased in ice up to “those parts about which it is better to be silent”. Dante foolish? Dante stupid?
M. SB:
Leaving aside such other objections to your posts as can be posed, I’ll grant they illustrate Mr. Shea’s argument of what constitutes dissent from a Catholic understanding of the matter.
Just a question, Mr. Stillbelieve: When a person is suddenly struck with a heart attack in the middle of doing something such as playing hockey (it has happened before to non-professional players who were not fit enough), and if that person is in a state of mortal sin, it becomes that person’s problem and we trust Divine Mercy to help him/her. Same thing for a murder victim: at the time of death, it means that God has decided to call that person home and has allowed a murder to take place, instead of a heart attack or a car crash. Therefore your argument about the Magisterium having to find a way to absolve the sin of the murdered person and thus exempt the victim from Hell in case s/he is in a state of mortal sin at the time of death, before you accept the teaching of that same Magisterium about the death penalty, does not hold too much water.
@Marthe Lepine
Are you arguing that “being murdered” is covered under the Magisterium teaching of prolife being from “conception to natural death?”
Mark,
You made two comments that caught my attention:
You said: “those who advocate the use of the death penalty beyond the absolute bare minimum times when it is truly necessary (meaning, in First World Countries, basically never) are, in fact, dissenting from the guidance of the Church”
Think about the implications of you saying this only applies to “First World Countries,” since this indicates the Third World Countries don’t have to listen and can indeed use capital punishment at or above the levels of the past. So this means that a Catholic living in a Third World Country does have to sit on his hands, because his country cannot afford first class jails, and thus DP remains a totally viable and common means of punishment and safety.
I was looking at chart of DP statistics and it said 52 people were executed in 2009 in the US. I’d bet there are over 52 people executed every day in Third World Countries. So it seems one’s reading of EV is relative to their geographical information, for if you (Mark) were typing your thoughts from Third World Country, your argument wouldn’t work.
You later said: “Should such watertight arguments emerge for the technological (not the moral) impossibility of abolishing the death penalty, then the Church would, of course be obliged to acknowledge that bloodless means do not exist”
Why is the Church dependent upon what technology makes possible? The Church speaks on faith and morals, not so much technology.
Lawrence:
The Church’s prudential judgement is dependent on technology because the argument for minimizing application of the death penalty depends on the idea that other means for punishment can be found which will not endanger innocent life. So if your jail is a bamboo shack and you are not able to keep your murderous goon there without him tunnelling out, it may be necessary to execute him to keep him from killing again. If, however, you have the technology to keep him from killing again, then don’t execute him. This also, of course, take into account changes in the prisoner, such as the repentant Karla Faye Tucker, who we killed unnecessarily despite the fact that she had clearly become a Christian who abhorred her crime.
I don’t care if they eliminate the DP just as long as they allow the prisons to treat their prisoners like Sheriff Joe Arpaio in AZ treats his.
Very good! I love what you said about “docility” and the fact that you use this as your starting point.
It is all about obedience and humility and trusting the Church. In my own experience, whenever I have been able to do this, whenever I have been able to open my heart and mind and listen (rather than INSIST on my own will), then to my own surprise, I eventually see things in a different light and it is a better light. And I always end up thanking the wisdom of the Church!
You make very good and reasonable points about ending the death penalty. Personnally, I would love to see a moratorium on the death penalty in California (and I have written about it on my blog).
To all the devout and involved Catholics who insist that they have the right to stick to their own opinions re: this matter, even when it is becoming more and more evident that they are not in sync with the Church, I would love to ask: could you try, for one full year, to listen to the other side? To re-read what the Church and the Bishops have said? To pray for guidance in this matter? To find one of your friends who happens to be anti-death penalty and to listen to them wholeheartedly?
Don’t forget that all the saints praise “docility” as the best gate to holiness…
@Michele
“To pray for guidance in this matter?”
Have you ever looked into the facts of this issue? Do you realize what is being taught today by bishops and priest that you are advocating is based on an assumption that have no facts backing it up? Do you realize that capital punishment is not a sin unless it is applied to people who are knowingly innocent? Do you know that people have been murdered BECAUSE a state ended its capital punishment with the bishops support and endorsement?
It is well and good to be “docile,” but not ignorant…peoples’ lives and safety are at stake. If you prefer, as I do, to be an educated, knowledgeable docile believer you’ll discover the truth about this issue in a government, three year, $5,000,000 investigation on the safety that solitary confinement for capital offenders provides the innocent public. Google Operation Black Widow Pelican Bay Prison and discover what federal prosecutors, the California State Corrections Director, wardens and state and local police have to say about their ability to provide for the publics’ protection from further harm by such convicted people housed in solitary confinement with no in person contact with other prison inmates. If you do so, let me know here and I’ll check out what you have to say about it on your blog.
@Mark
“I remarked the other day that those who advocate the use of the death penalty beyond the absolute bare minimum times when it is truly necessary (meaning, in First World Countries, basically never) are, in fact, dissenting from the guidance of the Church.”
Give us an example of what “basically never” is. Is less than 3% “basically never” enough? That’s what this “First World” country of ours has going. Less than 3% of all capital offenders cases get the death penalty.
PS. Have you checked out the articles on Operation Black Widow?
Opponents to capital punishment simply refuse to confront the fact that church teaching on capital punishment has been accepted, unchanged and unchallenged, for nearly 2,000 years – until now. One ambiguous sentence added to paragraph #2267 of the catechism is endlessly quoted by opponents to give cover to their opposition.
Several connected things are brought to mind this day, October 7.—- Saint Pope Pius V, The Battle of Lepanto, the order of Mass, the Council of Trent, and the fifth commandment.
Oct 7, is the feast day of Our Lady of the Rosary. The day was proclaimed by Saint Pope Pius V because of the intercession of Our Blessed Mother at the battle of Lepanto. Pope Pius V arranged an alliance of Catholic states, who, although outnumbered defeated the Ottomans at the Battle of Lepanto. A rosary procession had been offered on that day in St. Peter’s Square for the success of the mission to hold back Muslim forces from overrunning Europe. 30,000 Muslim were killed while the Catholic allied losses were 7,500. This victory Pius V attributed to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and he instituted the feast, Our Lady of Victory now Our Lady of the Rosary, Oct 7.
It was Saint Pope Pius V who standardized the Mass by promulgating the 1570 edition of the Roman Missal. This form of the Mass remained essentially unchanged for 400 years until1970. We know what happened then, sad to say, and now the damage is slowly being corrected.
It was also Saint Pope Pius V in 1566, who ordered The Roman Catechism of Trent to be issued. This was the universal catechism in use until 1992.
Below are excerpts of this clear teaching. No emotional philosophizing here.
THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT : “Thou shalt not kill”
Importance Of Instruction On This Commandment
“No means more efficacious can be adopted to promote peace among mankind, than the proper explanation of this Commandment and its holy and due observance by all. Then might we hope that men, united in the strictest bonds of union, would live in perfect peace and concord.” …
“The necessity of explaining this Commandment is proved from the following. Immediately after the earth was overwhelmed in universal deluge, this was the first prohibition made by God to man. I will require the blood of your lives, He said, at the hand of every beast and at the hand of man. In the next place, among the precepts of the Old Law expounded by our Lord, this Commandment was mentioned first by Him; concerning which it is written in the Gospel of St. Matthew: It has been said thou shalt not kill, etc.” …
“The faithful, on their part, should hear with willing attention the explanation of this Commandment, since its purpose is to protect the life of each one. These words, Thou shalt not kill, emphatically forbid homicide; and they should be heard by all with the same pleasure as if God, expressly naming each individual, were to prohibit injury to be offered him under a threat of the divine anger and the heaviest chastisements”. …
“Execution of Criminals”:
“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.” …
“Remedies Against The Violation Of The Fifth Commandment”:
“Of these remedies the most efficacious is to form a just conception of the wickedness of murder. The enormity of this sin is manifest from many and weighty passages of Holy Scripture. So much does God abominate homicide that He declares in Holy Writ that of the very beast of the field He will exact vengeance for the life of man, commanding the beast that injures man to be put to death. And if (the Almighty) commanded man to have a horror of blood,’ He did so for no other reason than to impress on his mind the obligation of entirely refraining, both in act and desire, from the enormity of homicide.”
“The murderer is the worst enemy of his species, and consequently of nature. To the utmost of his power he destroys the universal work of God by the destruction of man, since God declares that He created all things for man’s sake. Nay, as it is forbidden in Genesis to take human life, because God created man to his own image and likeness, he who makes away with God’s image offers great injury to God, and almost seems to lay violent hands on God Himself !”
Thank the Lord that Saint Pope Pius V was not “docile”. The Church Militant sorely needs masculine leadership but it is becoming more and more feminized. The only way the “pacifized” will be kept safe and free is through the exertion of better MEN than themselves.
I’m actually fine with the Church’s teaching on the death penalty.
But I seem to recall that when EV came out, one of the problems that some people had was that there seemed to be a disconnect in the explanation of what the death penalty was actually for. Before EV, the death penalty was said to be partly about retributive justice, while after EV, it was only about protecting society.
As for protecting society, it seems to me that the Charles Manson case is evidence that, if we really want to, we can keep someone locked up for life without killing him. That guy is NEVER getting out of prison.
Unfortunately, Mark Shea presents a reductionist view ad has no intention in presenting his opposition accurately. Fact is, he is afraid and cowardly will not subject his uneducated view to any significant challenge. He doesn’t even have the dignity to tell his readers who he is quoting so that they can access the other argument, and that is Matthew Bellisario @ Catholic Champion. This is just another indication of the morally corrupt and intellectually dishonest tactics Mark Shea engages in, and if he had a shread of decency he would allow his readers to access both sides of the argument. But no, he is a pathetic loser with a keyboard and a blog.
@Karen
“As for protecting society, it seems to me that the Charles Manson case is evidence that, if we really want to, we can keep someone locked up for life without killing him. That guy is NEVER getting out of prison.”
Karen, you don’t have to get OUT of prison to still be a danger to innocent people. Please read my post to Mark above and find out from the people you are obligating to protect us from further harm if that is possible.
From some one who has been there:
“The blood of the murderers’ new victims is at least partially on the hands of those who make the execution of such killers impossible.”
This is from the Symposium on the Death Penalty - First Things Magazine, October, 2002. By Judge Robert Bork, American Enterprise Institute, Washington, D.C. Judge Bork was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan in 1987 but the Senate, led by Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden, rejected his nomination mainly because of his pro life views.
“I argued a case for the government in which the defendant had told friends that he wanted sex with a young girl, went to a public swimming pool, seized a ten-year-old girl, threw her in the back of his pickup truck, drove her through town while she screamed futilely for help, took her to a river, raped her, drowned her, and then bought beer to drink while sharing his happy recollection with friends. If ever a man deserved the death sentence, he did, and he got it.”
“Life imprisonment does not, in any event, fully protect society. Imprisoned murderers have killed guards and other prisoners. They have been paroled or escaped and killed again. Just two years ago, seven hardened criminals, one of whom was serving eighteen life sentences, escaped from a maximum-security Texas prison. A few weeks later, while robbing a sporting goods store, they killed a police officer, shooting him thirteen times and then driving over his body. The blood of the murderers’ new victims is at least partially on the hands of those who make the execution of such killers impossible.”
“The Church is not only a spiritual body representing Christ on earth but also a quite human political and cultural institution. As such, it resembles the judicial system in being vulnerable to the tides of the culture, particularly the culture of the intelligentsia.”
“The Church does not have any monopoly on truth about our obligations to the poor, the rights of undocumented workers, the real meaning of pluralism, or our international responsibilities. These are matters of prudential judgment and the Church should not attempt to foreclose discussion as if correct answers are known only to the clergy.”
“The Church does not have any monopoly on truth about our obligations to the poor, the rights of undocumented workers, the real meaning of pluralism, or our international responsibilities. These are matters of prudential judgment and the Church should not attempt to foreclose discussion as if correct answers are known only to the clergy.” Judge Robert Burk.
Well said and so true. It is because of such positions on the issues mentioned above, and now the death penalty, that so many Catholics fall for the temptation of PRIDE - feeling morally superior being and remaining Democrats. I heard a perfect name for such people - moral morons. Why? Because they will go against their professed beliefs and prayers in Mass on Sundays and support the only worldly institution that has made and kept abortion-on-demand the law-or-the-land. 52,000,000 babies, they profess to believe were created by God, have been murdered by abortion, an intrinsic EVIL, and in church on Sundays those Democrats pray for God’s “will be done on earth…and to not be lead into temptation, but delivered from evil,” praying all of this while standing before Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. Do those Catholics believe it is God’s will to create life for it to be aborted? They must because their actions prove it so. It is more important to them to be a Democrat than to be true to their OWN word. Their identity as a Democrat is more meaningful than their identity of being a Catholic. It would be emotionally easier for them to stop being Catholic than it would be to remove their name from the Democrat Party and stop voting for Democrats until their party changes its position on abortion. Yep, moral morons is what they are. And they are proving it true once again with their acceptance of the misguided, new thinking on the part of the magisterium concerning capital punishment.
Actually many people are misrepresenting the Church’steaching on Capital Punishment. The Church has always upheld the right of the State to punish evil doers even with the death penalty. This is the teaching of the Church and has not changed! Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI personally do not feel it is necessary and ask govenments to limit its use. They have not changed the Church’s teaching on the right of the State to use capital punishment. They are only speaking of the prudence or effectiveness of the practice. It is wrong and evil even when people are praying for an end to abortion and euthanasia to also add in “for an end to the death penalty”. These are not in the same category and should not be linked toghether. The death penealty is just and abortion and euthanasia are murder. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church despite the errors and smoke of misinformation being given out, even by many well-meaning but ignorant Catholics.
@stillbeleive: you are missing my point entirely! There is more to docility than you realize.
There is more to the Good News than what you state: the heart of Christianity is about charity, compassion and forgiveness, even and especially for the ones who do not desserve it. He is raising the bar and asking us to do more, he is asking us to participate with Him in the sanctification of the world.
@Michele
“@stillbeleive: you are missing my point entirely!”
I’m not missing your point. I’m stating that your point is hollow because it is based on a false belief. Eliminating capital punishment is not going to bring about “sanctification of the world.” Did you read what the federal prosecutors, the professionals working in the penal system, and the police chiefs say about their ability to protect the public from capital offenders in solitary confinement? “Raising the bar” has to be based on what is possible, i.e., facts and truth, not false assumptions. Of course, anything is possible for God, but this is as much of a distraction as the “invention” of Bernardin’s Seamless Garment was to bringing about the end of the evil of legal abortions twenty-seven years ago.
Evil is not going to be confined. The world is not going to be “sanctified” by us. That will only occur when Jesus returns…unless there is another book of the bible I am not aware of. Until then, we, as a Church, need to purify ourselves in order to produce good fruit and we can’t even do that. 52,000,000 murdered babies, and millions and millions of miserable, suffering women over what they have done, yet Catholics give their name identification and votes to the only organization that supports that murdering and fights to keep it legal. Church going Catholics are the largest, single voting block for that organization…and the bishops, and Catholic laity are complicit in its continuing. Opening up another front that is deplete of any spiritual richness, as is the case of ending capital punishment, contradicting centuries of magisterium teaching, while the bishops and clergy can’t even get their own house in order seems to be more about “feeling good” about ones self than really seeking to bring about God’s “will to be done on earth…and deliver us from evil.”
Catholics, alone, can bring about the end of legal abortion simply by removing their names from the Democrat rolls, and stop voting for them. That, in itself, is something that is simple and doable, and would be a gigantic step towards bring about the “sanctification of the world” that so inspires you. All Catholics have to do is just stop being Democrats. But therein lies the problem, they won’t; their self-identity comes more from being a worldly Democrat than being a God fearing Catholic.
Mat 10:14
The Fathers and Doctors of the Church are unanimous in their support for capital punishment. St. Augustine writes in The City of God:
“The same divine law which forbids the killing of a human being allows certain exceptions, as when God authorizes killing by a general law or when He gives an explicit commission to an individual for a limited time. Since the agent of authority is but a sword in the hand, and is not responsible for the killing, it is in no way contrary to the commandment, ‘Thou shalt not kill’ to wage war at God’s bidding, or for the representatives of the State’s authority to put criminals to death, according to law or the rule of rational justice.”
St. Thomas Aquinas in Summa Theologica, 11; 65-2; 66-6.
“If a man is a danger to the community, threatening it with disintegration by some wrongdoing of his, then his execution for the healing and preservation of the common good is to be commended. Only the public authority, not private persons, may licitly execute malefactors by public judgment. Men shall be sentenced to death for crimes of irreparable harm or which are particularly perverted.”
Opponents also falsely claim that execution denies murders the opportunity for repentence. St. Thomas Aquinas is much closer to the reality - “executions represent mercy to the wrongdoer.”
“...a secondary measure of the love of God may be said to appear, for capital punishment provides the murderer with incentive to repentance which the ordinary man does not have, that is a definite date on which he is to meet his God. It is as if God thus providentially granted him a special inducement to repentance out of consideration of the enormity of his crime…the law grants to the condemned an opportunity which he did not grant to his victim, the opportunity to prepare to meet his God. Even divine justice here may be said to be tempered with mercy.”
If the wisdom of the two of the greatest minds of the church is no longer valid for some of us:
“The reversal of a doctrine as well established as the legitimacy of capital punishment would raise serious problems regarding the credibility of the magisterium. Consistency with scripture and long-standing Catholic tradition is important for the grounding of many current teachings of the Catholic Church; for example, those regarding abortion, contraception, and the permanence of marriage. If the tradition on capital punishment had been reversed, serious questions would be raised regarding other doctrines.” Avery Cardinal Dulles, “Catholic Teaching on the Death Penalty”, in Owens, Carlson & Elshtain, op. cit., p. 26. 2004
“As the Church’s teaching on contraception cannot “develop” in a way that would declare its intrinsic evil to be good, so the right of a state to execute criminals cannot “develop” so that its intrinsic good becomes evil.” - Father George Rutler, pastor of the Church of our Savior in New York. He has a weekly program on EWTN and is the author of several books.
Pope Pius XII in 1952
“Even when there is question of the execution of a condemned man, the State does not dispose of the individual’s right to life … by his crime, he has already dispossessed himself of his right to life.”
Michele, do you think the “Mission of the Twelve” was to end capital punishment or pronounce the “The kingdom of heaven is at hand?” Math 10;6,7. So, are you saying with this one bible verse, v 14,that the magisterium is saying, “If you don’t believe in this prudential judgment you are to disassociate from such unbelievers?”
Or is that verse you wrote referring to Catholic Democrats and abortion?
“But,” says an honest DP supporter, “the Church’s teaching is predicated on an ‘if’. “If bloodless means are sufficient…”
This is the crux of the matter and I wrote a book about it.
An excerpt.
[If] means, one assumes, refer to imprisonment in maximum security or super-max prisons, yet, we see several recent articles revealing how easily the imprisoned aggressor acts towards innocents outside of prison, beginning, as noted by Bykowicz (March 9, 2008):
Now 28 years old, [….] has lived all but six months of his adult life behind bars. His home for the past four years, the Western Correctional Institution in Cumberland, is even farther from Baltimore — a place in which he might never have set foot. Yet authorities say they believe [he] commanded one of Baltimore’s largest and most violent gangs….
From his prison cell, according to a federal racketeering indictment last month, [he] enforced the gang’s rules and oversaw its activities, including violent initiations, witness intimidation and five murders. (n.p.)
Another story from Ward (2008) notes how easily even death row prisoners are able to communicate, unfettered by supervision, with the outside world:
[Texas] State prison officials, moving to address the headline-grabbing security breach caused by smuggled cell phones, on Wednesday proposed spending nearly $66 million on high-tech gear to curb contraband.
The plan is more than twice as costly as an earlier-announced plan to beef up security at Texas’ 112 state prisons and is larger than several past programs to build prisons.
Smuggled cell phones have been an issue since October, when [a] death row convict … was busted for possessing a phone on which more than 2,800 calls had been made in one month — including calls to a state senator. (n.p.)
Another article from North Carolina also addresses the cell phone issue. (Kane, 2008)
Cigarettes, drugs and booze used to drive a prison’s black market economy. Today, state prison officials are trying to stop another item from being smuggled in — cell phones.
So far this year, the N.C. Department of Correction has confiscated roughly 140 cell phones that were found on inmates or stashed on prison grounds. The phones are considered contraband, but they are coming in anyway.
They arrive by visitors who sneak them in, by inmates returning from work release and, in some cases, by staff looking to make a fast buck. A $25 phone can sell for as much as $500 behind bars, prison officials say, and inmates who have them can charge others for their use.
Prisons director Boyd Bennett said the cell phones can be used for all kinds of mayhem in and out of prison. They can be used to set up attacks on inmates and staff, coordinate escapes, harass victims and allow criminals to continue running criminal enterprises outside prison. (n.p.)
And, yet another article about cell phones in California prisons, where Thompson (2009) notes:
Richard Subia, California’s associate director for adult prisons, called cell phone use in state prisons “one of the most severe security issues that we have right now.”
It’s been a problem in prisons across the country.
A condemned inmate in Texas used a smuggled cell phone to make a threatening call to a state senator in October. Authorities say a drug dealer behind bars in Maryland used a phone to arrange to have a witness assassinated outside his home last summer.
In Kansas, a convicted killer sneaked out of prison after planning the 2006 escape using a cell phone smuggled by an accomplice. The following year, two inmates escaped another Kansas prison with the help of a former guard and a smuggled cell phone.
California prison officials confiscated about 2,800 cell phones statewide last year, double the number discovered the year before. Inmates can be punished for having them but have found ingenuous ways to hide them. (n.p.)
And yet one more from Fenton (2009):
The court records read like a scene out of Goodfellas: From their prison cells and with the help of corrections staff, authorities say, members of a violent gang were feasting on salmon and shrimp, sipping Grey Goose vodka and puffing fine cigars — all while directing drug deals, extorting protection money from other inmates and arranging attacks on witnesses and rival gang members…
A search warrant outlines how gang members were able to obtain heroin, direct hits on enemies through so-called “Death Angels” and conduct cell phone conference calls to arrange business with inmates around the state.
“It’s not enough just to catch the bad guys and get them convicted and sent to prison,” said Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein. “We need to make sure that while they’re in prison, they’re isolated and not able to carry on and continue their gang activities.” (n.p.)
And finally from the Pelican Bay super-max in California, often considered the model of super-max facilities, Montgomery (n.d.) notes:
Most of the inmates in the SHU are gang members. Their cells are windowless and nearly bare. The men are locked inside for 22 and a half hours a day, usually alone. They are held in virtual isolation to try to keep them from working together, but even the SHU can’t stop some leaders from running their gangs…
“The head leaders of [all the gangs] they’re in prison,” says [a Pelican Bay warden until 2004]. “And they control the activities of the gang both within the prison system and in our communities in California and now unfortunately, have even spread to other states.” (n.p.)
Hopefully, the Catholic capital punishment abolition movement will reconsider their conclusion that other means—like life imprisonment or incarceration in super-max prisons—can protect the innocent from the aggressor, based on the porous nature of even the most secure of American prisons.
Lukenbill, D. H. (2009). Capital Punishment & Catholic Social Teaching: A Tradition of Support, Lampstand Foundation, Sacramento, California. (pp. 57-62)
“But,” says an honest DP supporter, “the Church’s teaching is predicated on an ‘if’. “If bloodless means are sufficient…”
This is the crux of the matter and I wrote a book about it.
An excerpt.
[If] means, one assumes, refer to imprisonment in maximum security or super-max prisons, yet, we see several recent articles revealing how easily the imprisoned aggressor acts towards innocents outside of prison, beginning, as noted by Bykowicz (March 9, 2008):
Now 28 years old, [….] has lived all but six months of his adult life behind bars. His home for the past four years, the Western Correctional Institution in Cumberland, is even farther from Baltimore — a place in which he might never have set foot. Yet authorities say they believe [he] commanded one of Baltimore’s largest and most violent gangs….
From his prison cell, according to a federal racketeering indictment last month, [he] enforced the gang’s rules and oversaw its activities, including violent initiations, witness intimidation and five murders. (n.p.)
Another story from Ward (2008) notes how easily even death row prisoners are able to communicate, unfettered by supervision, with the outside world:
[Texas] State prison officials, moving to address the headline-grabbing security breach caused by smuggled cell phones, on Wednesday proposed spending nearly $66 million on high-tech gear to curb contraband.
The plan is more than twice as costly as an earlier-announced plan to beef up security at Texas’ 112 state prisons and is larger than several past programs to build prisons.
Smuggled cell phones have been an issue since October, when [a] death row convict … was busted for possessing a phone on which more than 2,800 calls had been made in one month — including calls to a state senator. (n.p.)
Another article from North Carolina also addresses the cell phone issue. (Kane, 2008)
Cigarettes, drugs and booze used to drive a prison’s black market economy. Today, state prison officials are trying to stop another item from being smuggled in — cell phones.
So far this year, the N.C. Department of Correction has confiscated roughly 140 cell phones that were found on inmates or stashed on prison grounds. The phones are considered contraband, but they are coming in anyway.
They arrive by visitors who sneak them in, by inmates returning from work release and, in some cases, by staff looking to make a fast buck. A $25 phone can sell for as much as $500 behind bars, prison officials say, and inmates who have them can charge others for their use.
Prisons director Boyd Bennett said the cell phones can be used for all kinds of mayhem in and out of prison. They can be used to set up attacks on inmates and staff, coordinate escapes, harass victims and allow criminals to continue running criminal enterprises outside prison. (n.p.)
And, yet another article about cell phones in California prisons, where Thompson (2009) notes:
Richard Subia, California’s associate director for adult prisons, called cell phone use in state prisons “one of the most severe security issues that we have right now.”
It’s been a problem in prisons across the country.
A condemned inmate in Texas used a smuggled cell phone to make a threatening call to a state senator in October. Authorities say a drug dealer behind bars in Maryland used a phone to arrange to have a witness assassinated outside his home last summer.
In Kansas, a convicted killer sneaked out of prison after planning the 2006 escape using a cell phone smuggled by an accomplice. The following year, two inmates escaped another Kansas prison with the help of a former guard and a smuggled cell phone.
California prison officials confiscated about 2,800 cell phones statewide last year, double the number discovered the year before. Inmates can be punished for having them but have found ingenuous ways to hide them. (n.p.)
And yet one more from Fenton (2009):
The court records read like a scene out of Goodfellas: From their prison cells and with the help of corrections staff, authorities say, members of a violent gang were feasting on salmon and shrimp, sipping Grey Goose vodka and puffing fine cigars — all while directing drug deals, extorting protection money from other inmates and arranging attacks on witnesses and rival gang members…
A search warrant outlines how gang members were able to obtain heroin, direct hits on enemies through so-called “Death Angels” and conduct cell phone conference calls to arrange business with inmates around the state.
“It’s not enough just to catch the bad guys and get them convicted and sent to prison,” said Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein. “We need to make sure that while they’re in prison, they’re isolated and not able to carry on and continue their gang activities.” (n.p.)
And finally from the Pelican Bay super-max in California, often considered the model of super-max facilities, Montgomery (n.d.) notes:
Most of the inmates in the SHU are gang members. Their cells are windowless and nearly bare. The men are locked inside for 22 and a half hours a day, usually alone. They are held in virtual isolation to try to keep them from working together, but even the SHU can’t stop some leaders from running their gangs…
“The head leaders of [all the gangs] they’re in prison,” says [a Pelican Bay warden until 2004]. “And they control the activities of the gang both within the prison system and in our communities in California and now unfortunately, have even spread to other states.” (n.p.)
Hopefully, the Catholic capital punishment abolition movement will reconsider their conclusion that other means—like life imprisonment or incarceration in super-max prisons—can protect the innocent from the aggressor, based on the porous nature of even the most secure of American prisons.
Lukenbill, D. H. (2009). Capital Punishment & Catholic Social Teaching: A Tradition of Support, Lampstand Foundation, Sacramento, California. (pp. 57-62)
Unfortunately, Mark Shea presents a reductionist view ad has no intention in presenting his opposition accurately.
Alex: Spare me. I quoted Bellisario’s letter unedited.
It is because of such positions on the issues mentioned above, and now the death penalty, that so many Catholics fall for the temptation of PRIDE - feeling morally superior being and remaining Democrats. I heard a perfect name for such people - moral morons.
I was unaware that Popes JPII and Benedict XVI and the world’s bishops are either Democrats, full of pride, or moral morons. Good of you to stoop down and correct the Magisterium from your lofty perch of humility.
The world is not going to be “sanctified” by us.
“There are many forms of the apostolate whereby the laity build up the Church, sanctify the world, and give it life in Christ.” - Decree on the Apostolate of Laity - Apostolicam Actuositatem
It is well and good to be “docile,” but not ignorant
And it is not well and good to be both dissenting and ignorant, stillbelieve. Before arrogantly popping off against the Magisterium, try learning what it teaches.
Mark, another excellent article. It took me a while to warm up to your writing - it always challenges me and makes me think. I especially appreciate your ability to firmly present the Faith in an un-partisan matter, if that makes sense. We are not to be liberal or conservative, democrats or republicans; but faithful Catholics. God bless.
hotI agree completely with Mark that one should .of pit the present Church teaching against that of previous popes and Councils. However, it is not at all clear to me how they are to be reconciled either. This is not say that they cannot be, only that I don’t see how. They seem to be opposed, whereas development of doctrine means making more clear a truth that is already implied by a previous teaching. Also, there is normally a lead up time where theologians and others present various sides before Rome steps in and decides (e.g. the teaching on the Immaculate Conception) . Here the teaching does not seem to correspond to the regular pattern so it’s diificult to reconcile with earlier teaching. Perhaps some explanation of this would go a long way in clearing up the confusion that always surrounds this teaching.
Mark,
Your points are well taken. I accept the teaching of CCC 2267. I also understand your legitimate use of hyperbole. But my concern when it comes to the death penalty is somewhat different than those who may be described as “death penalty enthusiasts”. My objection to lumping the death penalty in with abortion, euthanasia, ESCR, etc. is philosophical and practical. The death penalty is different from abortion, euthanasia, ESCR, homosexual acts, etc both in terms of essence and magnitude. And lumping it in together with abortion, euthanasia, ESCR, etc can and does at times unduly muddy the waters for people who have to make imperfect choices at the polls.
In terms of essence, the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, but abortion, euthanasia, ESCR and homosexual acts all are. There is no such thing as a “just” abortion or “just” euthanasia, no such thing as moral homosexual acts or moral ESCR, but there is such a thing as a “just” execution. In terms of magnitude, just to focus on the most obvious dichotomy, there have been roughly 1,300 executions in the U.S. since 1976 vs. roughly 50 million abortions since 1973 (Roe v Wade).
I agree with your point about the technical aspects involved in minimizing the use of the death penalty and the due limitations on the Church’s competence in that area. But I also wonder if what you seem to be characterizing as a *development of doctrine* in regard to the death penalty, might better be described as a new *pastoral application* of Church’s doctrine on the death penalty. Of course, this isn’t to suggest that one should feel free to ignore that new pastoral directive. But, if we are talking about a pastoral application, then dissent from it would be of a different import than dissent from actual doctrine or big “T” Tradition.
Personally, I find your arguments about the dangers related to distorting/dissenting from the Church’s teaching on “Just War” to be more persuasive and important today. While there’s still a difference in essence between war and abortion/euthasia/ESCR/homosexual acts, etc (there is such a thing as “just war”)—there’s at least much greater similarity in magnitude in the case of war than there is with the death penalty. The number of civilian deaths in Iraq and the deaths of our own troops should greatly trouble any Catholic. And the “pre-emptive war” sabrers continue to be rattled.
@CatholicBri
“We are not to be liberal or conservative, democrats or republicans; but faithful Catholics.”
Please define what a “faithful Catholilc” is.
Sam Schmit
Very good and important comments. You are on the right track with good questions.
@Mark Shea
“I was unaware that Popes JPII and Benedict XVI and the world’s bishops are either Democrats….”
Obviously, Mr. Shea, the comment about Catholic Democrats being prideful “moral morons” is referencing that particular group of Catholics who are Democrats and citizens of the United States; it is not referring to popes and “bishops of the world,” just those bishops, clergy, religious and laity of the United States who give their name identification and votes to a political organization that is diabolically opposed to what they profess to believe and pray for. And if that isn’t a definition of a “moral moron,” then I don’t know what is. I am quite sure if any bishop or priest was a known member of the KKK, the USCCB would not tolerate such an affiliation to be condoned in their holy orders, nor would any priest condone known KKK members to be part of his congregation. Yet, the KKK was never responsible for promoting and defending an evil that murdered 52,000,000 human beings. So, why are the bishops and clergy giving a pass to the members of the Democrat Party? And for that matter, why IS the pope and “the worlds bishops” silent on the U.S. bishops’ tolerance for having such members among their ranks?
I said, “The world is not going to be ‘sanctified’ by us.”
You replied, “There are many forms of the apostolate whereby the laity build up the Church, sanctify the world, and give it life in Christ. - Decree on the Apostolate of Laity - Apostolicam Actuositatem”
So why don’t those Catholics who can stop the pro-abortion party dead in its tracks do so by registering out of the Democrat Party and refuse to vote for any Democrat as long as that party continues its support for murdering babies who the Catholic Church teaches are created by God? Those Catholic Democrats are in the perfect position to “build up the Church, sanctify the world, and give it life in Christ” by that one, simple action that will save hundreds of millions of human lives created by God which would be a bigger statement than anything ever done before by the Church in standing up for what they “profess” to believe and “pray” for.
I said, “It is well and good to be ‘docile,’ but not ignorant…”(in the context) “that peoples’ lives and safety are at stake.”
You replied, “And it is not well and good to be both dissenting and ignorant, stillbelieve. Before arrogantly popping off against the Magisterium, try learning what it teaches.”
Speaking truth with facts to back it up, Mr. Shea, is not “popping off against the Magisterium.” Having learned what the Magisterium teaches about capital punishment enables me to argue for the clarification and correction that is needed in the unwarranted changing of centuries of consistent wise teaching on this matter. Just as the U.S. Bishops’ expansion of the definition of the word “prolife” to include prudential judgment issues, which had nothing to do with the intrinsic evil of abortion, resulted in giving cover to the proabortion party and enabled morally moronic Catholics to believe it is OK to give their name identification and votes to that party regardless that such ACTIONS contradict what they profess to believe and pray for in church on Sundays, so has this wrongly assumed and unwise change in the magisteriums teaching on this issue only benefited the party of death, strengthening their hold on the morally moronic.
@stillbelieve
good question. One who is obedient to the teachings of the Church, (both ex-Cathedra and normal magesterial) as opposed to a “catholic, but” or a cafeteria catholic. One whose Catholic faith supercedes party or national loyalty. One who can accept before he fully understands. Just some thoughts. What do you think? God bless.
Still Believe:
This piece is not about supporting the Democratic Party. It’s about the Church’s teaching on the death penalty. Please stay on topic.
@Mark “Still Believe:
This piece is not about supporting the Democratic Party. It’s about the Church’s teaching on the death penalty. Please stay on topic.”
The topic is docility vrs dissent on the new Catholic teaching of the death penalty. I dissent on that teaching because it is based solely on a false assumption and neither the magisterium, you, or any one else defending the teaching have presented evidence supporting the assumption; whereas, I have presented evidence to it being a teaching based on a total falsehood. I dissent even further because it is another supposedly spiritual position presented by the magisterium to make the faithful seem more consistently and spiritually “prolife.” This is just like the U.S. bishops’ annexing, with the approval of the magisterium, the so called “social justice” issues to the original “prolife” issue of abortion on the assumption that it would broaden the appeal of “prolife” and make the faithful seem more spiritually consistent. With that, legal abortion would have a larger base of opposition to bring it to an end. That didn’t happen. What happened was Catholic Democrat consciences, struggling with their Catholic moral teachings on abortion and their political identity as Democrats, were assuaged. Such Catholics started claiming mockingly that their “’prolife’ doesn’t end with birth.” And so they continued staying in the pro-abortion party and supporting the party candidates. They were not dissenting from the magisterium’s teaching on abortion as much as they were simply being docile on the many other social justice issues the Church was now teaching being “prolife,” also. That “plan,” based on a false assumption was implemented by the U.S. Catholic bishops twenty-seven years ago, and the murdered baby count has now grown to 52,000,000 and still growing.
There are consequences of false assumptions. In the case of the bishops’ promoting the end of capital punishment, more innocent people will be murdered and harmed, not less. In addition, it strengthens the hand of the only political party that is diabolically opposed to so much of the cultural heart of what the Church teaches. Today, the U.S. bishops are facing the consequences of what their false assumption of blending abortion and “social justice” issues lead to; political mandating of all health care programs providing abortions and contraceptives at no patient cost with no exclusions for religious organizations and requiring Catholic medical facilities to perform and provide these “services;” political forcing adoptions be made to same sex couples regardless of the adoption agencies moral position; political forcing of performing homosexual marriages or face criminal charges of discrimination. All these political laws and pressures against the Church are coming from the pro-abortion party that Catholics remain the largest, single voting block for thanks to the United States Conference of Catholic bishops and to the “social justice” issue they have been so supported of.
“Docility” has its consequences, and our culture and Church are paying the consequenes for it.
Those who are pro life and oppose capital punishment have Strange Judicial Bedfellows
All of the recent and current Supreme Court Justices who are pro life(Scalia, Roberts, Alioto, Thomas)support capital punishment. The Supreme Court Justices who opposed capital punishment (Stevens, Marshall, Breyer, Ginsberg, Souter, Blackmun) were/are pro abortion. Who knows about Kagan and Sotomayer. Probably pro abortion and anti capital punishment. All major media outlets that oppose capital punishment are pro abortion.
Forgot former Chief Justice Rehnquist - Pro life & pro capital punishment.
Still Believe:
Thank you for illustrating so perfectly everything I am warning about. Your behavior is as concise an illustration of the cafeteria anti-catholic Catholic of the Right as Maureen Dowd’s is of the anti-Catholic Catholic of the Left. At least you don’t use euphemisms. You openly and nakedly describe what you do as “dissent”, which is refreshingly honest, if still bearing no discernible resemblence to “faithful conservative” Catholic faith anymore.
@Mark
“You openly and nakedly describe what you do as ‘dissent’, which is refreshingly honest, if still bearing no discernible resemblence to ‘faithful conservative’ Catholic faith anymore.”
So, agreeing with the following statement is “bearing no discernible resemblance to ‘faithful conservative’ Catholic faith anymore?”
“Above all, the common outcry, which is justly made on behalf of human rights—for example, the right to health, to home, to work, to family, to culture—is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination. (Christifideles Laici, no. 38) This was prefaced by Fr. Pavone who said; ““Pope John Paul II explained the importance of being true to fundamental Church teachings.”
All of the Church teachings on so-call “social justice” issues are “FALSE AND ILLUSORY” IF “the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the CONDITION for all other personal rights, is not DEFENDED with MAXIMUM DETERMINATION.” (my emphasis)
Mark, what part of FALSE AND ILLUSORY do you not get? Are you going to claim that church-going Catholics, including the clergy and religious, who give their name identification and votes to the Democrat Party are “DEFENDING THE RIGHT TO LIFE WITH MAXIMUM DETERMINATION?
Or are you going to agree with me that they are NOT defending the right to life “with Maximum Determination” by the mere fact of their continuing endorsement and voting for the pro-abortion party? And they are doing so because of all the other “False and Illusory” prudential judgment issues the U.S. bishops tagged on to the meaning of the word Pro-Life, diluting the meaning of that word which was coined to counter the pro-aborts calling themselves “pro-choice” soon after Roe v. Wade. For ten years after Roe v. wade, “Pro-life” only meant anti-abortion, and “anti-abortion” is the only name the pro-abortion media would call us by. That is why the media loved it when Cardinal Bernardin came out with his “Seamless Garment” speech which was the introduction of the social justice issues to the debate because it allowed the Catholic Democrats now to claim they are “pro-life” too. And Catholic Democrats remain the largest, signal voting block for the pro-abortion party.
If “faithful” Catholic Democrats removed their names from registration voter rolls in the pro-abortion party, and stopped voting for their candidates until the party changed its position on abortion, then that would be a major step towards defending the right to life with “maximum determination.” Completing that step by voting for suitable pro-life candidates not of the pro-abortion party would be defending the right to life with maximum determination. With Catholics doing one or both of those steps, the pro-abortion party would have to change its position on abortion or face permanent minority status. Catholic clergy could preach this action from the pulpit with no fear of government interference because abortion is a spiritual issue to us in that our Christian identity comes partly in professing our belief that “God is the giver of life.” Also, we pray for His “will to be done on earth.” Certainly, God does not create life to be aborted; He is not in contradiction with Himself. But Catholic Democrats are in contradiction (including most of the clergy) with what they profess to believe and pray for in Mass on Sundays.
Calling for the end of capital punishment is not a “prolife” position because it endangers innocent human beings by capital offenders who are locked away in solitary confinement. And that information comes from multi-million dollar studies of the most high tech prisons we have. The professionals working in the prison field at the highest level all agree they can not stop such people locked away in solitary confinement from continuing to murder and harm people out in the public. Just look it up, Mark. If I could find it just stumbling around, certainly a person with your investigative skills should be able to find it too.
Once again, this is not about voting Democrat, Still Believe. The notion that being docile to the Church’s teaching regarding the death penalty somehow means being pro-abortion is incoherent rubbish. You aren’t even making sense.
If it is not intended to be pro-life, then what is it?
Correction. The new teaching on the death penalty calls for the end of capital punishment. That is being passed off as another “pro-life” position by Catholic Democrats, which only reinforces their support for the pro-abortion party because that party’s members are more in support of ending CP.
JPII, Benedict and the world’s bishops are not Catholic Democrats, and they are pro-life and anti-death penalty. Your dissent is incoherent nonsense.
Mark, they are “anti-death penalty” as long as advanced societies are able to prevent capital offenders of the worst kind from further harming innocent people. If ANY U.S. bishop, or any of their 350 staffers at USCCB headquarters in Washington D.C., or any of the tens of thousands of U.S. clergy of any rank had read the U.S. papers about Operation Black Widow at Pelican Bay Prison in California back in April 2001 as I have they would have learned there is no possible way to protect society from such individuals even when they are housed in solitary confinement behind glass window cells with no contacted with other inmates, and guarded 24 hours a day. Twelve people in such confinement were found guilty of murdering five people and drug running, which happened all outside of their prison walls. Good god, man, look it up and get real. This is life and death stuff you and the magisterium are dealing with and you better know what the facts are before you start pronouncing what societies are supposed to be able to do. You and they are leading Catholics to advocate positions that endanger innocent human beings with wishful thinking. Such wishful thinking lead the U.S. bishops to adopt expanding the definition of ProLife to include prudential judgment issues and all that that did was guarantee the continuation of abortion-on-demand remaining the law of the land the last 27 years resulting in the murder of babies exceeding 52,000,000 with no end in sight. Why are you defending that?
I notice that you constantly avoid addressing my defense with JP II’s saying that focusing on social justice issue is “FALSE and ILLUSIORY” if MAXIMUM DETERMINATION is not used to defend the right to life. Those are his words, not mine. I notice you continuously state that the popes and the world’s bishops are not Democrats when I’ve never said or implied they were. I noticed you have not replied to my argument that Catholic Democrats are responsible for abortion remaining legal in our country with the U.S. bishops giving them the excuse to remain supporting the pro-abortion party because of their adding social justice issue to the prolife name. I notice you ignore my comments about the majority of the clergy being registered in the pro-abortion party.
The proof is in the pudding. Abortion on demand remains the law of the land 27 years after the U.S. bishops messed with the definition of prolife in order to broaden its appeal with the addition of social justice issues so that more people would consider themselves prolife and bring an end of abortion. It has failed and has made it more difficult politically to end the legalization of abortion. And the push to end capital punishment is going to have the same impact as expanding the definition of prolife; more innocent human lives are going to be murdered and harmed. But the direction the magisterium has taken with CP is more disturbing because it is based on a false assumption and they are not even interested in verifying what they claim to be possible is in fact possible. That is negligence bordering on non forgiving for an institution such as the Roman Catholic Church. And I am dumbfunded that you would defend it.
I’m done here. Try as you may, the ridiculous attempt to say that a desire to limit punishment to bloodless means is somehow pro-abortion is just that: ridiculous. As I say, your behavior is a textbook example of the conservative anti-Catholic Catholic, dissenting from the Magisterium’s authority to develop the Tradition (initially with a bunch of stuff about how the Church can’t deprive us of the right to kill people who “don’t deserve to live” and then switching to the tactic of claiming expertise about correctional facilities—all while blathering nonsense about the whole thing being a way of making abortion okay—cuz that’s obviously the goal of JPII, Benedict and the bishops.
Your arguments are nonsense and I’m done replying to you, SB. Thanks for illustrating my point, I think.
Mark, perhaps it is your mind’s way of digesting my arguments that causes them to seem like “nonsense” to you. Not once did you counter my evidence and logical conclusions with evidence defending your position. All you do is revert to distorting and dismissing what I said. And then you quit, and declared victory. I’m disappointed that you decided to disengage.
As far as I am concerned, seeking truth is the most important objective. And the question I have is why are the absolutes ignored in what Pope John Paul II had to say in describing the insignificance of so-called “social justice” issues to the paramount importance for “maximum determination” being used to bring about the Right to Life? While his absolute words are ignored in the case concerning the Right to Life, his assumptive words are overly emphasized in attempting to end capital punishment. In the first case the bishops take no aggressive action, while in the second they do. The first issue deals with an intrinsic evil that is always a mortal sin while in the second case, there is no sin involved at all. In the first case, 52,000,000 innocent lives created by God are murdered. In the second, evil actions on the part of a capital offender found guilty are justification for forfeiting the murderer’s right to life. Why is the Church failing at bringing about a legal right to life while succeeding in ending the executions of horrendous murders?
I have a question, mostly to “stillbelieve”: Somehow today as I was looking for something on the Internet, this banner ad came for some international aid program, that said that, each and every minute, 4 children die of starvation and/or malnutrition. Calculated on the basis of 60 minutes an hour, 24 hours a day and 365 days a year, this gives a little over 21 million children, or about 50 million in 2 and a half year. The argument that no other right has any value is one is not allowed to live in the first place, does it mean that it is better to let the children live so they can starve to death a couple of years later? Giving absolute priority to anti-abortion work at the expense of all and any other “social justice” issue is doing just that: If we are not concerned about what happens to the kids once they are born, e.g. social justice issues that would allow their parents to look after them, we are in fact saying that they could just as well die of starvation, we just do not care… And please remember: each and every time we recite the Creed, either during Mass or each time we start saying the Rosary, we affirm that we believe in “The resurrection of the body and life ever-after”. Well, all those aborted children, who were given life by God even though their parents were totally ignorant of their pro-creative mission, are going to come back to live in the end days, and enjoy eternal life, most probably in Heaven, without having had to go through all the earthly difficulties we have to go, while we are “straining to reach the goal”. The reward we are working towards is probably already theirs, and they are praying for all of us. Another point: What makes the unborn children in the US more important that the already born children in Africa and other poor countries who are starving to death at the rate of 4 a minute? In my opinion as a foreigner (up North from the US) is that it is dangerous and stupid to link anti-abortion to a so-called duty to vote for a particular party that has certainly not proven its real interest in saving the children and allowing their parents to earn a living wage.
Dear Martha,
First, forgive me if this is a bit harsh, but your argument about aborted children being in heaven is appalling. By that logic, perhaps we should kill *all* children in the womb to help them attain heaven? And remember, children under the age of reason are likewise unable to sin. So the very young you mentioned would be in the same boat. Or maybe it’s not so bad to kill an adult after he’s baptized because he’ll go straight to heaven? This just isn’t a good argument to make.
Of course, you’re right that unborn children aren’t any more important than born children or any other living human beings. But there’s a fundamental difference between supporting the right to directly and intentionally kill an innocent human being (abortion) and disagreeing over foreign policies that may or may not indirectly result in the loss of human life. People can legitimately disagree over the extent to which our government should be sending foreign aid to other countries, for instance. Too often, the money and aid is largely swallowed up by thugs, corrupt governments, and dictators (not that those groups are mutually exclusive!) and so it’s wasted. People can also legitimately disagree about economic issues and their impact on society. Some people prefer more government intervention in the economy, some people prefer more emphasis on the private sector. There’s room for good-will, legitimate disagreement. But there is no room for disagreement on abortion. No country should legally sanction the direct and intentional taking of any innocent human life. Ever. It’s evil. Period.
Up close and personal
A story from 13 years ago that points out the total disregard of death penalty opponents for the pain and suffering perpetrated on the murder victims and their families. This story could be repeated thousands of times.
The murder of Becky O’Hearn
In 1980, Rebecca O’Hearn was twenty-two years old and had recently graduated from Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond. Ms. O’Hearn was from a family of teacher and was working her way through graduate school. Becky worked evenings at the Minit Mart Convenience Store in Richmond, Kentucky. On Thursday evening, January 17, 1980, she went to work. She worked alone in the store that night.
Harold McQueen, his girlfriend Linda Rose, and his half-brother William Burnell, were driving around Richmond in Harold’s car that evening. They had spent the afternoon drinking heavily, smoking marijuana, and taking pills. At about 11:30 p.m., they drove to the Minit Mart Store on Big Hill Avenue to rob it. Harold and Keith got out of the car and entered the front door. Linda Rose remained in the car. McQueen ordered the 22 year old clerk, Rebecca O’Hearn, to empty the cash register and the safe. After she complied, McQueen shot her in the face from a distance of three to six inches and as she fell to her knees he shot her in the back of her neck. That bullet fragmented and entered both her spinal canal and brain stem. Rose testified that McQueen said “I know the !@#$% is dead.”
Shortly after 11:30 p.m. a Park Ranger stopped by the Minit Mart. He found Becky O’Hearn face down on the floor behind the counter. She was on her knees and her face was in her hands and near death.
——
After 17 years of appeals the execution date was near. McQueen had faced death warrants before. Governor Martha Layne Collins signed 1 in 1984 and Patton signed 1 in 1996. Both expired because he had not yet exhausted all 9 stages of his court appeals. Much sympathy for McQueen came from spokesmen for the Archdiocese of Louisville. They pictured McQueen as a model prisoner who had repented of the murder and was now a dedicated Christian.
Just hours before ordering an execution date for McQueen, Archbishop Thomas C. Kelly of Louisville and Bishop J. Kendrick Williams of the Diocese of Lexington, requested a meeting with Patton and asked him to commute McQueen’s death sentence to life in prison. The said that “The Catholic church teaches it is wrong for the state or any human to take a life.” (A blatant falsehood) . Bishop Williams, a close friend of Kellys, was later forced to resign because of sexual abuse charges.
Charles O’Hearn, Becky’s father, wrote to Governor Paul Patton. He described how McQueen shot his daughter in the face after she had quietly complied with an order to open the safe, then shot her again in the back of the neck as she knelt crying on the floor. “I urge you to sign the death warrant and set an execution date.”
The day before his execution and after all his appeals were exhausted, McQueen, the dedicated Christian, recanted his confession by saying that his half brother had actually killed Becky O’Hearn. Someone else should pay the penalty.
17 years after Becky O’Hearn was left crying and dying on the floor of a convenience store, Harold McQueen was executed for her murder.
But the horror of Becky’s death is prolonged for the family.
August 7, 1997 – The Record, archdiocesan paper
Archbishop Kelly speaking to the inmates at LaGrange penitentiary – “So I want to tell you that I regard Harold’s death as an injustice. In its own way it was just as unjust as the death of John the Baptist.” …. “There’s no justification for the death of John the Baptist – absolutely none. In our own time, Harold McQueen has been a good example of that.”
On the day of his execution, the Church of the Epiphany tolled their bells in memorial for McQueen., not Becky O’Hearn.
Dec 4, 1997 – The Record
Archbishop Kelly, speaking about capital punishment to the young women at Assumption High School – “They [the State] don’t have the right to kill in you name. That’s one of the biggest things you have to learn.” (another falsehood) …. “Our biggest problem is getting past the vengeance …and I did not find that interest in our girls today. They don’t seem to be in that vindictive mode.” Kelly again – “Harold would have been a great witness, a great guide, somebody who could have brought much to the world.”
McQueen was the first person executed in Kentucky in 35 years. Archbishop Kelly and The Record have given at least ten times as much space in their protest against capital punishment as they have against the thousands of abortions performed in this state. And hardly a word about contraception which has denied life to a least as many Catholic children as have been born.
Dear Mike, the idea that aborted children are probably in Heaven is actually not MY opinion; I have read it in a reputable source. The bottom line is not that babies are the smallest and weakest of victims, so let us get all emotional about the issue to the exclusion of all other. The bottom line is that nobody has the right to play God and decide when someone’s life should end (by the way, the unborn do have life, it is just that it is getting snuffed out too soon, so it is a fact that they will partake in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting). On the other hand, that plain and clear principle, that no-one has the right to decide when a person’s life will end, would not raise as much fanatical emotion as the unborn and would probably not help recruit voters for one particular party or the other. (I realize that if I said this in person instead than on a keyboard, I risk being stoned to death…)
Dear Martha,
My objection wasn’t to the belief that aborted may be in heaven. That’s an open theological question (although I think it’s an exaggeration to say they are “most probably” in heaven). My objection was that you clearly seemed to be suggesting that abortion wasn’t as bad as people make it out to be because aborted children will go to heaven - and without having to go through the “earthly difficulties” the rest of us must endure. That’s a very bad argument to make.
Also, your statement about ending human life isn’t quite right. The Church teaches that it is permissible, even sometimes required, to take actions that will result in the death of human life.
Just War is one such case (CCC 2308-2310): http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s2c2a5.htm#2308
Legitimate Defense is another (CCC 2263-2267): http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s2c2a5.htm#2263
What is *never* permissible is the direct, intentional killing of the innocent. That is why the abortion is intrinsically evil. It is immoral always and everywhere. Period. The same is true of euthanasia.
Peace.
Correction to the first sentence above: “My objection wasn’t to the belief that aborted children may be in heaven.”
Docilty means you would have followed Popes on burning heretics in another age:
Alexander IV (1254-61), Clement IV (1265-68), Nicholas IV (1288-02), Boniface VIII (1294-1303) and Pope Leo X in Exsurge Domine.
@Marthe Lepine.
“In my opinion as a foreigner (up North from the US) is that it is dangerous and stupid to link anti-abortion to a so-called duty to vote for a particular party that has certainly not proven its real interest in saving the children and allowing their parents to earn a living wage.”
Please forgive the delay in responding to your post (intended mostly for me), I have been distracted by other matters.
There were several areas in your post that I could have addressed here but choose the above quote because it epitomizes bias, judgmentalness and, for lack for a better word, ignorance in the mind such as yours. It is the mind of a liberal, perhaps even one of a progressive, the name socialist prefer to be identified by and called today.
First of all, where did I ever say in any of my post that anti-abortion people should vote for “particular party?” I presume you mean by a “particular party” the Republican Party. That is an assumption you made that is in error. My position is that Catholic Democrats who believe the words they say out loud in church on Sunday cannot be honest in what they say they believe and pray for in church if they continue to give their name identification and votes to the pro-abortion party. Their actions belie their words.
Second, you smear that “particular party” by saying it “has certainly not proven its real interest in saving the children.” Where’s your proof?
You could also say the same thing about the Roman Catholic Church of the U.S. since they haven’t “proven” their “real interest in saving the children” either. The problem, though, with saying that about the U.S. Catholic Church is – it’s true and I can prove it. That proof would explain how a Catholic such as yourself has come to think the way you do. My proof is in a book written about the “father” of the so-called “social justice” movement in the U.S. Catholic Church, Cardinal Bernardin of the Archdiocese of Chicago. It’s entitled, “Cardinal Bernardin – Easing conflicts- and battling for the soul of American Catholicism.” It was written by a friend of the Cardinal’s for over 30 years and published several years before the Cardinal died. Nothing in his book was refuted by Cardinal Bernardin or the Archdiocese, not even the statement that says, “Not only would this move (adding “social justice” issues to the definition of prolife) gain greater support from Catholics and others but it would keep the prolife movement from falling completely under the control of the right wing conservatives who were becoming its dominant sponsors.” Cardinal Bernardin was more interested in saving the Democrat Party which runs Chicago and controlled most of his congregation, than he was in saving the unborn; the Democrat Party was the main fighter for abortion-on-demand remaining the-law-of-the-land.
Marthe, it takes both parties in the U.S. to support a Right to Life Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, otherwise the votes are not there in Congress to pass it. It also takes 60 votes in the U.S. Senate to guarantee a presidential appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Democrats have tried to stop every Republican presidential nominee suspect of being willing to overturn Roe v Wade, which is the 1973 ruling that overturned all abortion restrictions in the U.S. The Democrat Party has been successful in keeping most of such appointment off the bench.
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