Capital punishment and catholisism

Does the Roman Catholic Church sanction the death penalty ? In his encyclical Evangelium Vitae (1995 , the late Pope John Paul II made public the Vatican 's position on the matter , viz , that the death penalty should not be used against condemned criminals except in cases of absolute necessity : in other words , when it would be possible otherwise to defend society (56 . Coming from the highest ecclesiastical authority , this pronouncement should have put to rest perceived ambiguities in the Church 's stand on capital punishment . But the issue has refused to die down

in view of the conflicting statements of other Church pastors , citing Biblical and theological authority in support of their respective positions vis-a-vis the death penalty . This focuses on what the Church actually teaches in the light of historical and doctrinal evidence and contemporary thought

There is no dispute that the Church condemns abortion as a crime against the unborn . Pope John Paul II 's Evangelium Vitae and Crossing the Threshold of Hope define in no uncertain terms the Church 's position on these issues . But does its pro-life stance extend to the execution of convicted criminals

The current controversy was partly provoked by Avery Cardinal Dulles when , addressing a congregation , he stated that if the Pope were to deny that the death penalty could be an exercise of retributive justice he would be overthrowing the tradition of two millennia of Catholic thought , denying the teaching of several previous popes , and contradicting the teachings of Scripture ' Likewise , in a speech Justice Antonin Scalia , a Catholic judge , told his audience that judges who could not apply the death penalty in cases before their courts must leave the bench (Altiere n .d

What , then , is traditional Catholic thought on the matter ? We may quote from the Summa Theologica of St . Thomas Aquinas , the Doctor of the Church himself , who compared an evildoer , i .e , a criminal , to a bodily member that festers to the detriment of the others its excision when necessary , may be advantageous to preserve the whole body

Now every individual person is compared to the whole community , on account of some sin , it is praiseworthy and advantageous that he be executed in to safeguard the common good . Now the care of the common good is entrusted to persons of rank having public authority wherefore they alone , and not private individuals , can lawfully put evildoers to death (Q .64 Art . 2-3 Pt . II-II

Tradition has it that the Church held fast to the natural law principle that the state has the right to defend its citizens and maintain public and in to enforce it , recourse may be had to the death penalty . By such means , the rights of the innocent are protected from those who have no respect for such rights and who by reason thereof forfeit their own right to live (Gonzales n .d

Pope Innocent I is said to be the first pontiff to indorse capital punishment in the year 405 , stating thus...