Death Penalty And Pro Life

[Mark of the Cross]

[quote name='MIkolbe' timestamp='1346202076' post='2475495']

And indeed, we have been condemned justly, for the sentence we received corresponds to our crimes, but this man has done nothing criminal.”
[/quote]
I don't doubt scripture, so I don't doubt that he said that. But I wasn't aware that he was some kind of lawyer who thought that CP by means of torture was somehow justifiable by God of love and mercy. I think he was referring to Roman law, not Gods law! Crucifixion is equated to torture. Does God use or endorse torture? To water board someone to obtain information that may save lives could be justifiable, just as a law enforcement officer shooting a felon with a knife can be justified. But can you really endorse torture to the death as a punishment?

[Anomaly]

Ed, there's a Yank saying "you won't find an atheist in a fox hole". It means that facing the possibility of immediate mortality, people tend to dismiss their doubts.
I won't get into the exigesis of the scriptures referred to. In the four accounts, their crimes were described differently.
I dismiss your claim that DP is only motivated by revenge. Punishment is roughly equivalent to the crime. A thief goes to prison for a few years but doesn't have to make restitution if not caught with the goods.
We aren't quibbling about actually crucifying a murderer, we are discussing putting to death someone who took an innocents life. I've been in prison (visiting), known murderers and others who have no regard for human life. I know prison guards and what they have to deal with and threat of harm they fear. It is elitist, naive, or ignorant to think all society is safe from people who murder just because they don't live in the apartment next door. I know too many ex-cons who related the brutality and fear they had to live with having monsters as their neighborhoods.
Society has lost its direction when the guy who robs a post office is given the same punishment as someone who murders in cold blood.

[Mark of the Cross]

[quote name='Anomaly' timestamp='1346208934' post='2475562']
I've been in prison (visiting), known murderers and others who have no regard for human life. I know prison guards and what they have to deal with and threat of harm they fear.
[/quote]
From discussions I get the impression that your experience has had a profoundly negative effect on you. But I also get the impression that you see CP as a clean convenient way of ridding society of people who could only be described as monsters. And as I have said before you have some valid points to justify it, in some cases! But I would hope that that would be extremely rare. If you imprison someone and then it turns out that they were innocent, you can release them and compensate them to some extent. How many innocent people have been executed? In most safety procedures we consider that if an option can save one life then it is worth adopting. Have you ever been inside a refugee detention centre? Apparently the conditions in them are very much the same as in correction centre's. The difference being that the people in prisons deserve to be there. So what are we to do, kill all refugees that are a threat to other inmates and security staff? And sure prisons are a dangerous place to be employed at, but so are refugee detention centres. So are the vast majority of the worlds cities. Afghanistan is very dangerous and many more people die there than get murdered in prisons. Are people forced to join the military and go to Afghanistan?

[quote]
It is elitist, naive, or ignorant to think all society is safe from people who murder just because they don't live in the apartment next door. I know too many ex-cons who related the brutality and fear they had to live with having monsters as their neighborhoods.
[/quote]
Hmmm not sure what you are saying here! But I've lived in a low class neighborhood with a den of drugos next door and feared for the safety of my family and myself. The local police thought it funny that I got my car pelted with lemons during a drunken drug fueled party. Lucky me I had some friends in the city council and a high up law enforcer or else I may be locked away. At that time guns weren't banned and I had one on hand.

[quote]Society has lost its direction when the guy who robs a post office is given the same punishment as someone who murders in cold blood.[/quote]
Has anyone suggested a standard punishment one sentence fits all crimes? At present Julian Knight of Hoddle street massacre fame wants to be released. Most people myself included think he should never be released. But if you have the situation where a young post office robber is liable to be beaten and raped in a prison and there is no way that you can safely guard him, then maybe your option is to kill the people who are likely to commit that crime. Problem is then you are in a situation of witch hunting. Killing people on suspicion! I get the impression that the majority of people see punishment as a revenge. A guy runs a red light and kills someone. The family are incensed that he gets a few years in prison instead of the death penalty. I uphold that the only consideration of social law should be protection of the public and deterrence of crime. I leave revenge to God, but I don't see him in that light.

Okay I'm game, I'll ask this one. People don't agree that the considerations of abortion as being comparable to CP. What about euthanasia? People are in horrible pain and hopelessly terminal and are pleading for a merciful end. Yet it is illegal! The only mercy they can get is from the doctor who gives them 'medicinal' quantities of morphine until it kills them. If you are going to have CP don't you have to have euthanasia? I'm open to opinion on that one, it's a contentious issue. But then you are faced with the situation where granny may be terminally ill but is still able to be fruitful. However the kids want granny out of the way for convenience or becuase the costs are eating into their inheritance so they pressure granny until granny becomes depressed and agrees. Who plays God?
Awhile back there was a qanda called 'Insight' where a panel of people who had killed in the line of duty where interviewed for its effect on them. The guy that seemed traumatized the most was an American ex executioner. Going into a war zone where you are aware that you may kill someone who is trying to kill you is different than going to work knowing that you will kill someone who is currently not a threat. CP may make conditions safer for some employees but not for others who have to carry the burden.
LOL anti virus blocked a Trojan when I looked up euthanasia laws in the US.

[Tony]

http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/pope-benedict-end-the-death-penalty/ need I say more?

[Totus Tuus]

I haven't read any of the replies so what I am about to say may have already been stated (and probably has). I personally asked Patrick Madrid this question myself (not about Holy Communion, but about the Catholic understanding of the death penalty).

1. John Paul II was speaking theological opinion there. That is not dogma, and while faithful Catholics should take to heart the Holy Father's opinions and reflect on them carefully, we are not bound by pain of sin to agree with him. I personally do believe that the death penalty is not the only way to protect society from harm in MOST cases. That is basically what JPII was saying, in my estimation. The CCC, however, is fully supportive of use of the death penalty in cases where there is no other way to protect innocent people from the harm an individual could cause. The same could be said for a father's obligation to protect his family-- the CCC sanctions force even if it is lethal, if that is the only way for him to protect his family from harm.

2. It would be absolutely inappropriate to refuse someone Holy Communion on the basis that they support the death penalty. I don't know of any instance where that has ever happened and I doubt it is common, because, as I said, JPII's opinion on the death penalty is not and official Church stance.

Now, as a matter of personal opinion, I believe that the death penalty SHOULD be used where there is no other way to protect the public and I agree with JPII that those instances are few and far between. I do believe that in under-developed countries with insufficient prison/justice systems, there is a very real possibility that the death penalty is needed still today. I can't think of an instance where that would be true in the US, but as an avid Pro-Life advocate (it's my full-time job), I don't protest death penalty executions in Texas because the Catholic teaching on the matter is not black and white, and because I believe that instances with much higher death rates (abortion and euthanasia) deserve greater attention. Euthanasia is a particularly big problem in TX.

[Ice_nine]

Are y'alls aware of what living in a supermax is like? Can't say I know from experience , but it seems like a pretty hellish place to spend out the rest of your days. I think in taking to account of "safety" we have to consider the psychological and emotional safety of the inmates, both the violent sociopath flavor and the crack dealer/robber/people who've done bad things but are capable of remorse.

I mean watch some prison documentaries and tell me how in the hell is it more merciful to not only subject sociopathic criminals to that type of psychological stress, perhaps torture, for the entirety of their lives AND subject other inmates who could conceivably be rehabilitated and perhaps be integrated back into society to that violent, caste-system that we call supermax prisons?

And sure we could stick all the real violent bastards into solitary confinement so they can't hurt anyone else. That way when the prison guard has to bring him his meals he is treated to a screaming maniac who has written on the walls of his cell with his own feces and blood. YAY for human dignity!

I mean I share y'alls revulsion of consciously putting a human being to death. I really do. It's something that should be avoided at all costs. I also have a visceral reaction to the idea of allowing rapists and those who inflict other tortures be allowed to walk free after a meager prison sentence (hey you raped a twelve year old girl and flooped up her life for probably forever . . . 4 years in a supermax for you sir). I also feel revulsion to allowing people who literally have zero capacity for empathy with violent criminals who have a chance of redemption in this lifetime. And finally even for those who are sociopaths, with almost no chance of repentance, I feel a revulsion to subjecting even those miserable bastards to the hells of supermax prisons.

[Tab'le De'Bah-Rye]

[quote name='Socrates' timestamp='1345759836' post='2473040']
[/quote]

To punish the guilty and to protect the innocent. I read that as if innocent lives are at stake,including the lesser crims in jail.Also it says it is the states choice, so not a church matter, we should have no opinion maybe. What was the jail system like that than anyway.? And if a certain offender is put in solitary confinement with no chance of release unless proving to be absolutely without a doubt psychologicaly able to be in the ordinary populace of the jail without killing them. Possibly in chains. And if the paticular offender does re-offend in jail than without a doubt solitary confinement for the remainder of there life, with a 1 hour walk in chains at midnight while the cell gets cleaned and the only thing in his or her padded cell with a padded toilet is a floppy book like those things for babies so they can't harm themselves with the book. And if one has re offended while in jail and no chance of getting out there can still be the chance of t.v. , computer game , writing material , material etc if again proven psychologicaly sound to manage these. And if self harming with any of these straight back to the floppy books and the process starts again. All this is just honest opinion, doesn't mean i'm right, or that my overview of the excert from the council of trent be any where near scholastic. Surely if pope JPII and Benedict XVI where speaking infalibly with those comments(which leads me to ask where they) than they would still be upholding all truths from every council previously, and you would have to search the vatican website as to the rest of the dialogue or speech or whatever to see the whole picture.

Edited August 30, 2012 by Tab'le Du'Bah-Rye

[havok579257]

[quote name='Ice_nine' timestamp='1346322286' post='2476230']
Are y'alls aware of what living in a supermax is like? Can't say I know from experience , but it seems like a pretty hellish place to spend out the rest of your days. I think in taking to account of "safety" we have to consider the psychological and emotional safety of the inmates, both the violent sociopath flavor and the crack dealer/robber/people who've done bad things but are capable of remorse.

I mean watch some prison documentaries and tell me how in the hell is it more merciful to not only subject sociopathic criminals to that type of psychological stress, perhaps torture, for the entirety of their lives AND subject other inmates who could conceivably be rehabilitated and perhaps be integrated back into society to that violent, caste-system that we call supermax prisons?

And sure we could stick all the real violent bastards into solitary confinement so they can't hurt anyone else. That way when the prison guard has to bring him his meals he is treated to a screaming maniac who has written on the walls of his cell with his own feces and blood. YAY for human dignity!

I mean I share y'alls revulsion of consciously putting a human being to death. I really do. It's something that should be avoided at all costs. I also have a visceral reaction to the idea of allowing rapists and those who inflict other tortures be allowed to walk free after a meager prison sentence (hey you raped a twelve year old girl and flooped up her life for probably forever . . . 4 years in a supermax for you sir). I also feel revulsion to allowing people who literally have zero capacity for empathy with violent criminals who have a chance of redemption in this lifetime. And finally even for those who are sociopaths, with almost no chance of repentance, I feel a revulsion to subjecting even those miserable bastards to the hells of supermax prisons.
[/quote]

i'm must have mised the part where america sanctions torture for its prisoners. can you should me where america condones such an action.

[Slappo]

[quote name='havok579257' timestamp='1346338433' post='2476285']
i'm must have mised the part where america sanctions torture for its prisoners. can you should me where america condones such an action.
[/quote]

Define torture... I'd say solitary confinement is torture. Human beings are social by nature, and to forcibly strip them of this IMO is torture. If solitary confinement can make people go crazy, what is not torturous about that?

[Mark of the Cross]

[quote name='Ice_nine' timestamp='1346322286' post='2476230']
Are y'alls aware of what living in a supermax is like? Can't say I know from experience , but it seems like a pretty hellish place to spend out the rest of your days. I think in taking to account of "safety" we have to consider the psychological and emotional safety of the inmates, both the violent sociopath flavor and the crack dealer/robber/people who've done bad things but are capable of remorse.

I mean watch some prison documentaries and tell me how in the hell is it more merciful to not only subject sociopathic criminals to that type of psychological stress, perhaps torture, for the entirety of their lives AND subject other inmates who could conceivably be rehabilitated and perhaps be integrated back into society to that violent, caste-system that we call supermax prisons?

And sure we could stick all the real violent bastards into solitary confinement so they can't hurt anyone else. That way when the prison guard has to bring him his meals he is treated to a screaming maniac who has written on the walls of his cell with his own feces and blood. YAY for human dignity!

I mean I share y'alls revulsion of consciously putting a human being to death. I really do. It's something that should be avoided at all costs. I also have a visceral reaction to the idea of allowing rapists and those who inflict other tortures be allowed to walk free after a meager prison sentence (hey you raped a twelve year old girl and flooped up her life for probably forever . . . 4 years in a supermax for you sir). I also feel revulsion to allowing people who literally have zero capacity for empathy with violent criminals who have a chance of redemption in this lifetime. And finally even for those who are sociopaths, with almost no chance of repentance, I feel a revulsion to subjecting even those miserable bastards to the hells of supermax prisons.
[/quote]
Sorry to be a bit harsh, but this is really very naive and a display of tunnel vision. Have you ever been in an immigration Detention centre or an institution for the mentally ill? In Australia, asylum seekers have sown their mouths shut, hung themselves and jumped off of roofs in protest at being locked up. I hate to pull the Hitler card, I really do, but that's where this is headed. We kill mentally ill children and asylum seekers because locking them up brings about the same result as correction centres. Oh while we're at it, the indigenous community not to mention poor whites has numerous social problems because of their nature and outback communities are more than comparable to SMaxs. So lets be humane and bring back permits to shoot them. Honestly we were treating them better when we were shooting them anyway. If you have an acceptable solution of how to deal with people whose only crime is to try to follow a dream to a life in a free country or are born black then please let our gov. know because they haven't got a clue on how to deal with it. The Lord said visit the imprisoned. I don't think he meant that as Catholics we should visit them for the purpose of thinking up lame excuses to justify voting for their death.

[Mark of the Cross]

[quote name='Slappo' timestamp='1346358421' post='2476386']
Define torture... I'd say solitary confinement is torture. Human beings are social by nature, and to forcibly strip them of this IMO is torture. If solitary confinement can make people go crazy, what is not torturous about that?
[/quote]
In Oz prisoners are treated better than the poor. A paedophile child sex offender gets a few years in prison. Is then given a comfortable cottage outside the prison walls with orders to report regularly and no go zones. While the poor sleep on the streets awaiting community housing. Inmates can go to school get their lawyers qualifications and take the state to court to try to gain release (Julian Knight) While this situation is a ridiculous extreme and shouldn't be. The other end extreme is bringing the use of solitary confinement into the argument as a reason to execute people. Like I mean doesn't the guy who embezzles his company and gets 5 years subject to tantrums and need time in the slammer. Do you suggest we execute anyone who is likely to warrant solitary by their inherent behavior? In Oz people do and should be allowed schooling to further their education and prospects of rehabilitation. I think that they should also have to work to repay their debt to the state and their victims.

[Norseman82]

[quote name='jaime' timestamp='1346025740' post='2474574']
What escapes are you talking about? The last maximum security escape that I can find is 2001. Breaking out of a max or supermax is impossible.
[/quote]

I know there are occasional escapes from Cook County jail. And why are there "Please do not pick up hitchhikers" signs near prisons?

[Jaime]

[quote name='Norseman82' timestamp='1346376515' post='2476509']
I know there are occasional escapes from Cook County jail. And why are there "Please do not pick up hitchhikers" signs near prisons?
[/quote]

Convicted murderers and rapists aren't being held in the county jail.

[Tab'le De'Bah-Rye]

[quote name='Mark of the Cross' timestamp='1346366969' post='2476446']
In Oz prisoners are treated better than the poor. A paedophile child sex offender gets a few years in prison. Is then given a comfortable cottage outside the prison walls with orders to report regularly and no go zones. While the poor sleep on the streets awaiting community housing. Inmates can go to school get their lawyers qualifications and take the state to court to try to gain release (Julian Knight) While this situation is a ridiculous extreme and shouldn't be. The other end extreme is bringing the use of solitary confinement into the argument as a reason to execute people. Like I mean doesn't the guy who embezzles his company and gets 5 years subject to tantrums and need time in the slammer. Do you suggest we execute anyone who is likely to warrant solitary by their inherent behavior? In Oz people do and should be allowed schooling to further their education and prospects of rehabilitation. I think that they should also have to work to repay their debt to the state and their victims.
[/quote]

Like an ongoing fine taken out of there pay cheque/bank account/social security each week till there probation period is over? Which leads me to think in some cases the probationary period should be longer.

Edited August 31, 2012 by Tab'le Du'Bah-Rye

[Tab'le De'Bah-Rye]

[quote name='Mark of the Cross' timestamp='1346365915' post='2476436']
Sorry to be a bit harsh, but this is really very naive and a display of tunnel vision. Have you ever been in an immigration Detention centre or an institution for the mentally ill? In Australia, asylum seekers have sown their mouths shut, hung themselves and jumped off of roofs in protest at being locked up. I hate to pull the Hitler card, I really do, but that's where this is headed. We kill mentally ill children and asylum seekers because locking them up brings about the same result as correction centres. Oh while we're at it, the indigenous community not to mention poor whites has numerous social problems because of their nature and outback communities are more than comparable to SMaxs. So lets be humane and bring back permits to shoot them. Honestly we were treating them better when we were shooting them anyway. If you have an acceptable solution of how to deal with people whose only crime is to try to follow a dream to a life in a free country or are born black then please let our gov. know because they haven't got a clue on how to deal with it. The Lord said visit the imprisoned. I don't think he meant that as Catholics we should visit them for the purpose of thinking up lame excuses to justify voting for their death.
[/quote]

I don't get it markoftehcross. Why do you say detention centres, that is media jargon. They are refugee processing centres. But i was alerted to the fact by my dad that the swine whom get them out of there countries lie to them and say they will be let in straight away and all will be well and to top it off they make them throw away all there identification papers which makes it difficult to process them to live in australia, so there given false hope and get angry. I have heard the refugee centres have pools,game rooms etc and there free to go in and out of the yard as they please. The one thing we need to do in these refugee centres is give them something to do , ie: education. The children there at the least should be going to school, and i rekon the adults also. At first english second language classes, and than actual school like maths,science etc. I just don't get it. If they are true refugees anything is better than the hell they where in, but there are also trouble makers whom come over and some of the trouble makers are escaping punishment from there respective national authorities, and for whatever reason the trouble makers are making trouble they effect others in the refugee centres to be discontent. You are watching the media story markofthecross that is usually the worst of the worst cases which isn't nescisarily the whole story.

Onward christian souls.
JESUS iz LORD.

St benedict. "prefer nothing whatsoever to christ."