Death Penalty

[franciscanheart]

[quote name='the_rev' post='1155016' date='Jan 2 2007, 10:29 PM']
Just for clarification I joined Dec. 13th 03

04, 05, 06= 3 years

(unless I'm doing [i]my[/i] math wrong, or do I not count one of those years?)
[/quote]
Take a chill pill dude. Seriously.

[goldenchild17]

[quote name='the_rev' post='1154798' date='Jan 2 2007, 06:21 PM']
Why is the death penalty an issue of importance. How does one defend the Catholic stance against the death penalty?
[/quote]

I'd say the Catholic Church supports the death penalty, so I'm not sure what to tell ya .

[prose]

[quote name='the_rev' post='1155016' date='Jan 2 2007, 09:29 PM']
Just for clarification I joined Dec. 13th 03

04, 05, 06= 3 years

(unless I'm doing [i]my[/i] math wrong, or do I not count one of those years?)
[/quote]

I forgot we were in 2007 now.

Doesn't matter, you STILL posted an average of 10 posts a DAY for THREE YEARS. And you don't have time to use the search feature?? AND you have never seen threads on this topic in that WHOLE TIME????



Well, an average of 9.2 a day, since we are being picky.

[Lil Red]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1154999' date='Jan 2 2007, 07:58 PM']
I don't know about that. I think that distinction would undoubtedly go to the Liturgy threads. :
[/quote]
i think someone should find out what has more threads dedicated to it

[Jaime]

[quote name='Lil Red' post='1155268' date='Jan 3 2007, 02:39 PM']
i think someone should find out what has more threads dedicated to it
[/quote]


I don't have time

[White Knight]

From what I read the Catholic Church, only opposes the Death penality if the criminal can be contained safely in a certian isolated area for the rest of his or her life, however, if a country cannot fullfill this obligation then the death penality is required, to keep the local and national communities safe from this person.

Now, heres where it gets alittle deep in the pickle jar, who has the ability to keep this obligation, certianly not places like India, China, Iran, Iraq, etc.

Even the US in some agurements fall into this.

but for the most part, places like China, and India cannot afford to keep a prisoner locked away for the rest of their natural lifes, "in order to keep the nation, city, or private residence safer" they have to well "lay down the law, and fullfill the captial punishment session."


To say the Catholic Church out right opposes the Death Penality in all cases, is a lie, and is not supported, by the Catechism of the Catholic Church.


Just leave at that.

The Catholic Church's stance on the Death Penality is a complex issue.

Edited January 3, 2007 by White Knight

[qfnol31]

The Old Catechism of Trent:

[quote]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. The end of the Commandment is the preservation and security of human life. Now the punishments inflicted by the civil authority, which is the legitimate avenger of crime, naturally tend to this end, since they give security to life by repressing outrage and violence. Hence these words of David: In the morning I put to death all the wicked of the land, that I might cut off all the workers of iniquity from the city of the Lord.[/quote]

The Baltimore Catechism #3:

[quote]Q. 1276. Under what circumstances may human life be lawfully taken?

A. Human life may be lawfully taken:

1.(1) In self-defense, when we are unjustly attacked and have no other means of saving our own lives; 2.(2) In a just war, when the safety or rights of the nation require it; 3.(3) By the lawful execution of a criminal, fairly tried and found guilty of a crime punishable by death when the preservation of law and order and the good of the community require such execution.[/quote]

The New Catechism:

[quote]2266 The State's effort to contain the spread of behaviors injurious to human rights and the fundamental rules of civil coexistence corresponds to the requirement of watching over the common good. Legitimate public authority has the right and duty to inflict penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime. the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense. When his punishment is voluntarily accepted by the offender, it takes on the value of expiation. Moreover, punishment, in addition to preserving public order and the safety of persons, has a medicinal scope: as far as possible it should contribute to the correction of the offender.[/quote]

[quote]2267 The traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude, presupposing full ascertainment of the identity and responsibility of the offender, recourse to the death penalty, when this is the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor.[/quote]

I just briefly want to point out that it does not deny other uses of the death penalty here, but just says that those that are necessary are legitimate and just. (All other things being upheld, such as the proper identity ascertained, etc.)

Qualified:

[quote]"The punishment imposed must be proportionate to the gravity of the offense. Given the possibilities which the State now has for effectively preventing crime by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm, the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity “are very rare, if not practically non-existent.” (Evangelium Vitae). When non-lethal means are sufficient, authority should limit itself to such means because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good, are more in conformity with the dignity of the human person, and do not remove definitively from the guilty party the possibility of reforming himself."[/quote]

I just want to point out that the Church, strictly speaking, is not completely against the death penalty and so it is impossible for you to argue why it is. There are so many colours to this argument, but at the very least it is sometimes acceptable for the state to execute a criminal, and so the strict argument that the Church forbids all such actions would not hold.

Edited January 5, 2007 by qfnol31

[rkwright]

haha wow.... I just read 16 of that 32 pager, and I think I'll call it there... that was a pretty heated one!