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Pope John Paul II in his encyclical, The Gospel
of Life (1995) wrote:
...the
nature and extent of the punishment must be carefully
evaluated and decided upon, and ought nopt 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. Today however,
as a result of steady improvements in the organization
of the penal system, such cases are very rare if not
practically nonexistent. (1)
In 1998, The
Catechism of the Catholic Church was supplemented
to quote this principle (2)
This teaching
is not new. St. Augustine recognized the need for
capital punishment in the 5th century, but warned against
vengeance and said "our desire is rather that justice
be satisfied without the taking of their lives or the
maiming of their bodies in any part..."
(3)
St. Thomas
Aquinas defended the death penalty as a means of protecting
the whole body of society in the 13th century, relating
the state's roll in execution to that of a physician who
"cut(s) off a decayed limb" in order to "care
for the health of the whole body." However, he also
proposed as a working norm that "in this life, penalties
should be remedial rather than retributive." (4)
Contrary to
the abilities of the penal systems of the 5th and 13th
centuries, Pope John Paul II points out
that we can protect the whole body of society today, and
that cases warranting the death penalty now are "very
rare if not practically non existent."
The Papal
Commission on Justice and Peace expressed opposition
to the death penalty as early as 1976. Over the last three
decades, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops has
issued statements against it four different times, and
the Florida Bishops six times. Nearly all European and
North, Central and South American countries have abolished
it, but not the United States.
In their recent
statement, Confronting a Culture of Violence, the United
States Catholic Bishops said:
Increasingly,
our society looks to violent measures to deal with some
of our most difficult social problems-- millions of
abortions to address problem pregnancies, advocacy of
euthanasia and assisted suicide to cope with the burdens
of age and illness, and increased reliance on the death
penalty to deal with crime. We are tragically turning
to violence in the search for quick and easy answers
to complex human problems... We are losing our respect
for human life... We cannot teach that killing is wrong
by killing.
(5)
The Bishops
of Florida said in 1990:
The
abolition of the death penalty would help break the
cycle of violence. It would manifest belief in the unique
dignity of every individual and the sacredness of human
life. It would acknowledge God as the Lord of Life and
it would be more consonant with the spirit of the Gospel.
(6)
| Grant,
therefore, that we may listen with open and generous
hearts to every word which proceeds from the mouth
of God. Thus we shall learn not onlyl to obey the
commandment not to kill human life, but also to revere
life, to love it and to foster it. (7) |
For more information
on the death penalty and Catholic teaching on it, contact
the Florida Catholic Conference at (850) 222-3803, PO
Box 1638, Tallahassee, Florida 32302-1638. Website: www.FlaCathConf.org.
- Pope
John Paul II, Encyclical, The Gospel of Life,
No. 56, (1995)
- Catechism
of the Catholic Church, 2265-2267 (revised 1998).
- St.
Augustine, Epistle 133, No. 1
- St.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 2a2ae, 66.6
- United
States Bishops, Pastoral Statement, Confronting A
Culture of Violence: A Catholic Framework for Action,
(1994)
- Bishops
of Florida, Pastoral Statement, Protection, Punishment,
But Not Death, (1990)
- The
Gospel of Life, No. 51
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