The Church has consistently taught that the state has the authority to use the death penalty. But, in recent years, popes and bishops have become more vocal in calling for an end to its use. Many Catholics instinctively favor life over death, even after the worst crimes, and some are left wondering if the Church’s mind is changing.
Two recent cases highlighted an apparent tension between traditional teaching and modern circumstances.
On July 13, the bishops of Tennessee wrote to Governor Bill Haslam asking him to halt a slate of planned executions. In their letter, Bishops Mark Spalding of Nashville, Richard Stika of Knoxville, and Martin Holley of Memphis emphasized the value and dignity of every human life, even those who have committed the worst possible crimes.
One day earlier, on July 12, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo, expressed his “support” for the Sri Lankan government’s decision to introduce the death penalty for drug traffickers and organized crimes bosses.
“We will support [Sri Lankan] President Maithripala Sirisena’s decision to subject those who organize crime while being in the prison to [the] death sentence,” he told local media. The cardinal went on to add that more needed to be done to prevent drug traffickers and crime bosses from operating with impunity while in jail.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches this: “Assuming that the guilty party’s identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.”
This formulation contains a heavy qualification. When exactly is the death penalty the only effective means of defending human life? That’s a thorny question.
St. John Paul II was outspoken in his opposition to the use of capital punishment. In an address in the United States, in 1999, he called for Christians to be “unconditionally pro-life” and said that “the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil.” He also spoke of his desire for a consensus to end the death penalty, which he called “cruel and unnecessary.”
That address, given in St. Louis, was credited with helping persuade to Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan to commute the death sentence of inmate Darrell Mease to life in prison.
More recently, Pope Francis has denounced capital punishment in even stronger terms. Speaking in October 2017, he called it “contrary to the Gospel” because “it is freely decided to suppress a human life that is always sacred in the eyes of the Creator, and of which, in the final analysis, God alone is the true judge and guarantor.” He has, however, stopped short of revising the official teaching contained in the Catechism.
There is a broad sentiment among American Catholics against the death penalty. It is a point of unusually strong consensus, even among those who normally disagree. In 2015, four Catholic publications with often-divergent viewpoints issued a joint editorial calling for an end to capital punishment.
But Catholic thinkers do not unanimously agree that a total renunciation of the death penalty is appropriate, or even possible.
Cardinal Joseph Bernadin, in his famous “Consistent Ethic of Life” speech delivered at Fordham University in 1983, explicitly recognized the legitimate authority of the state to resort to capital punishment. Cardinal Avery Dulles, writing in 2001, observed that “the Catholic magisterium does not, and never has, advocated unqualified abolition of the death penalty.”
While there is real scope for debate about when and how sparingly capital punishment should be used, Dulles concluded that “the death penalty is not in itself a violation of the right to life.”
While the trend of recent papal statements has been towards a relegation of the death penalty to, at most, a theoretical possibility, scholars have urged caution about going too far.
Dr. Chad Pecknold, associate professor of systematic theology at the Catholic University of America, told CNA that it was important distinguish between changing circumstances and a change in what the Church has always taught.
“The Church has always held that the death penalty is a just option available to the state, even if we do not welcome its use. St. Augustine says that the death penalty is just, but the Church should plead for mercy.”
“Mercy isn’t calling something that is just ‘unjust.’ Mercy relieves the punishment properly due to the guilty. As the Catechism recognizes, there can be circumstances in which the death penalty is a legitimate service to justice. This is qualified by a preferential option for other means, whenever they can serve the same ends.”
These alternative means have not been always and everywhere available. “The common and constant teaching of the Church can be applied to different circumstances. Alternatives available to us in modern western countries simply have not been present at other times, or may not be now in other places.”
There is a crucial difference between applying a consistent teaching to changed circumstances and appearing to suggest humanity has evolved beyond a previously valid doctrine, Pecknold said.
“The death penalty is not, and has never been a positive end in itself. It is a means towards serving justice. If we find we can now serve the same ends and express a preferential option for life, this is doubly good.”
In the West, conditions seem to be narrowing the scope for the death penalty’s use, and bishops are responding, which has led to a sense, especially after Pope Francis’ comments last year, that the Church might declare the death penalty absolutely unjust. Yet, as was recently seen in Sri Lanka and Tennessee, things are not yet the same everywhere.
That serves as a good reminder about the importance of understanding the Church’s global perspective, and the importance of distinguishing between teachings which supply criteria through which Catholics must make moral judgments, and teachings which declare that certain actions are, in fact, immoral everywhere and always.
Full story at Catholic News Agency.
If the U.S. bishops were as fervent about stopping their own from diddling boys and seminarians as they are about the death penalty, the church would be better off. Hard to take seriously the pleas of bishops to respect the inherent dignity of every human being when we all know what so many of them have done and covered up. That’s the way it’s going to be for the next fifty years, so get used to it bishops. Whenever you teach something, people are going to respond with oh, yeah, well what about McCarrick and all the bishops and priests who covered for him. Then it will be the next McCarrick, whoever it will be, and you know there will be another one, and the bishops will realize they’ve lost credibility.
Since when did the truth become contingent on who was saying it?
Even demons came out of many people, screaming, “You are the Son of God!” Lk 4:41
Truth is truth, bro. If folks make that error, that’s on them.
Not a good analogy and faulty reasoning to boot.
The Devil is an inveterate liar, unless confronted with Jesus Christ Himself. Not the case here, hardly.
The credibility of “Truth” absolutely does depend on who is saying it—-“This Laymen’s” point: Is it St. Athanasius speaking, or Elmer Gantry?
Many find the present cadre of bishops, from the top on down, a lot more like Elmer Gantry. What they teach today they may change tomorrow. Weather vanes, “Bro”.
Fact is, everything this man says is perfectly true. The Church WOULD be better off if the bishops were as reluctant to foster abuse as they are to discourage the death penalty. The abuses HAVE badly tarnished their credibility, and the moral authority of the Church, for decades to come.
The death penalty, as practiced in the US, isn’t very just, IMO. Firstly because, through the Innocence Project, we know that innocent people are put to death. Not many, but enough. Secondly because, as was referenced in the article, modern prisons here are very capable of isolating dangerous people from the public. There are, however, those incarcerated that are and always will be a danger to other inmates and correctional officers and even those on the “outside” that become targets of death contracts coming from prisons. As regrettable as it may be, these individuals can only be managed by the death penalty.
Yes. Also,the whole position that “protection of society” can be accomplished by imprisonment ignores the principle of deterrence. From time immemorial, the prevention of crime due to fear of punishment has been recognized.
Good to see the CNA admitting that the death penalty is infallibly, perennially valid in principle as an instrument of justice. Hardly ever hear of bishops or priests advocating mercy for victims of crime. As with illegal aliens, it’s always “oh, those poor immigrants” and never “those poor victims of violent crime committed by people who shouldn’t be here and who broke immigration laws by entering and residing in the U.S.”
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, was the Victim of an unjust application of the death penalty! The trumped up charges, the untruthful witnesses and the sham of a trial all led to the crucifixion of an innocent man – who happened to be God’s son. Capital punishment should be abolished.
interesting that Jesus himself acknowledged the state has the right to use the death penalty in certain cases as that right has been given “from above” (John 19: 10-11). The Scriptures recognize the right of government using the death penalty (Genesis 9: 5-6; Romas 13: 1-7, etc.), as did Augustine, Aquinas and throughout church history. If abolished, does that mean no matter how many people a person murders, how many lives are stolen, the murderer gets to keep his life? If the murderer in prison murders fellow inmates, security guards, and orders hits on those on the outside, he is still allowed to keep his life? How is that fair and just? The Scriptures certainly does not think so.
No, God himself authorized it. Without the existence of the death penalty, Christ could not have died on the cross. The fact that it was unjustly applied in Christ’s case is irrelevant. Pilate said to Christ “Do you not know that I have power of life and death over you?” Christ responded: “You would have no power if it were not given you from above.”
Our leaders shed tears for murderers who end up on death row and not the murder victims. Our leaders shed tears for illegal immigrants but not the people who are killed by them. Our leaders cover up for priests who molest altar boys and treat the altar boys that were molested like trash. There is a pattern of sympathizing with the perpetrator and being indifferent to the sufferings of the victims. That is not the example that Jesus set for them to follow.
This is pure red herring, not to mention betraying an ignorance of the ways of Our Lord. First, no one is shedding tears for the murderers only at the expense of the victims. Secondly, the scandal has NOTHING to do with capital punishment: this is false conflation. Third, Our Lord FORGAVE, Our Lord taught mercy, Our Lord taught to abandon the “eye for an eye” mentality rampant in many folks.
Of course Christ was innocent and the death penalty was a wrongful act on Him. Yes, the Lord forgives but does that rule out every type of justice, retribution? The Lord forgave the one crucified next to him but did not say he should not be executed since he is now forgiven. Also, the “eye for an eye”. understanding in the Old Testament had to do with just, appropriate compensation, usually monetary. For example, If I broke your arm, then I was to compensate you by paying your medical bills and pay for your loss of work time, until you are restored to where you were before the injury (lex talonis). Our civil law is based on that. “Eye for eye” had to do with just compensation to the offended. It actually was a progressive and…
So, has or has not the Church perennially taught the validity of the death penalty?
The teaching is: Thou Shalt Not Kill. Killing is always wrong. There are some circumstances where guilt is not imputed to the person who kills such as just war or self-defense. Guilt is also not imputed to an executioner.
One is bound not to do more harm than necessary. The state can justly apply the death penalty if there is no other means to keep innocents safe. The Church has declared that at this current time there is no justification for the death penalty.
Actually, the commandment reads, “Thou shall not murder”. In the ancient Hebrew and Greek, the word used is “murder”, not “kill”. All murder is killing but not all killing is murder. Murder is the unjust taking of human life. The Scriptures (& Church) recognize some cases of killings allowed – just war scenario, self-defense, and capital punishment (Old & New Testament by proper authorities and the Church until recently discouraging its use). The correct translation in English should be “Thou shall not murder” as it is in many English translations.
Avoided answering the question, so I’ll answer it for you:
The Church has in fact perenially taught the validity of the just imposition of the death penalty, notwithstanding statements of some recent popes.
How can something that St. John Paul II has judged “cruel and unnecessary” be valid in our times? How can something which two other popes, namely Benedict and Francis, have called to be abolished be valid? This rotting relic from the culture of death is not valid in our times.
Let me help you out, jon. I was not making a formal argument against the death penalty. I was pointing out a consistent pattern of behavior.
The English translations of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the Catechism of Trent have it as “Thou shalt not kill.” As does the New American Bible, Revised Edition, the New Jerusalem Bible, The Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition, the Vulgate, the Douay-Rheims: in all Exodus 20:13 is translated as “Thou Shalt Not Kill.” The New Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition translates it as “thou shalt not murder.”
“murder” in “thou shall not murder” is the accurate translation in English from the Biblical Hebrew and Greek (Septuagint & Koine Greek of Nw Testament).
There is some interesting Biblical exegesis posted regarding this topic. I never knew Our Lord Jesus confirmed the acceptability of capital punishment by uttering while under duress “You have no power other than that given to you from above.” I think this inference is made that cannot be supported by other parts of the Gospel. I find it interesting that some Catholics who are adamant about Humanae Vitatae turn a deaf ear to the recent teachings of three popes that the death penalty is immoral.