[Quiet Man Jr.]

Important info to prepare Catholics (of all political persuasions) for elections.

[JohnnyZ]

That’s hot.

[don-o]

For your imprimatur :)

[sageb1]

I am neither for nor against. I recognize that there are instances where it needs to be applied, such as the individual’s ability to do more damage, even as he or she is incarcerated. Advances in forensics and the use of DNA to prove innocence/guilt are of major importance also, because the possibility of putting the wrong individual to death is minimized.

What bothers me the most is the “cheering” by some when the death penalty is carried out. To me, it is a solemn and sobering event for us to judge that another human being is beyond redemption.

[fetal heart beats by 21st day]

I agree that some Catholics find this confusing, and quite a few, especially academics, exploit it.

Justice Scalia simply said that the state has a right to defend itself from people who mean it harm.That is Catholic teaching. Capital punishment is not intrinsically evil. Catholics are not supposed to be gleeful about anyone’s death-not even the death of the most heineous criminals. Justice Scalia was not gleeful.

The deliberate murder of innocent human beings, what we call abortion, is intinsically evil. Under Church teaching, the baby may be removed from the womb (not deliberately killed) only when the mother’s life is in imminent danger.

Church teaching, known as proportionalism, is often misused by elitists and, unfortunately, by Cardinal Bernardin, to suggest that abortion is one of many issues with which Catholics must be concerned. However, abortion is not an issue. It is the deliberate destruction of innocent human beings. In this country, that means 4,000 human souls are separated from their bodies daily through deliberate violence.

So, 4,000 innocent souls trumps poverty concerns,capital punishment(even if 4,000 accused adults are electrocuted daily), housing inequities, etc. If we ever get rid of institutionally protected murder of innocent human beings, then maybe there will be some reason to apply proportionalism to all other issues of injustice. Until then, altogether, they don’t come close to the death of 4,000 innocent human beings on a daily basis.

As usual, Scalia is maligned to promote some other agenda.

[Norman Bates]

Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput at a catechetical conference in 2002: “If we say we’re Catholic, we need to act like it. When Catholic Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia publicly disputes Church teaching on the death penalty, the message he sends is not so very different from Frances Kissling (of “Catholics for a Free Choice”) disputing what the Church teaches about abortion."

That statement is not consistent with paragraph 2266 of the Catechism of the Church. It is simply not true to say that the church opposed the death penalty under legitimate circumstances. It is quite unimaginable to single out Justice Scalia's support of a tenable Catholic doctrine and compare it to abortion supporters.

[SteveMcKing]

It is just as inhumane to lock a man away 23 hours a day for life in a spartan cell. It is just as inhumane to do it 2 hours a day. There is truly no end to the demands from those against death sentences. If they abolish the death penalty, they will quickly get to work demanding other accommodations for murderers.

Ultimately, the only Catholic justice is purely egalitarian -- meaning that the murderer is simply a victim of society's lack of love and forgiveness. Justice for the murdered is left only to God and prayer.

Prevention is unimportant (or certainly less important than faith), and anything resembling vengeance for individual victims is profoundly condemned.

"Disagreements with the prudential judgment of the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment should always be made in a spirit of filial respect."

That's kind of hard to do sometimes.... In fact it's patently stupid.

 

R.I.P.

Hayley Petit
Michaela Petit
Jennifer Hawke-Petit

[MountainFlower]

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