Presented by
Nina Butorac
Andy Warhol
The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective
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In Catholic tradition, the justifications for punishment are fourfold:
• Retribution
• Deterrence
• Security (Defense against the criminal)
• Rehabilitation
“Punishment, since it involves the deliberate infliction of evil against another, is always in need of justification."
U.S. Council of Bishops, 1980
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• Restoring to right order, or restoring the good.
– After an evil action, there should be a restoration of balance and order in society.
• Restitution to the victim may be required of the criminal who steals, for example.
– Retribution does not mean vindication or revenge.
• These actions are sinful in nature.
– Lex Talionis, or an “eye for an eye” from the biblical tradition of
Mosaic Law, appeals to this restoration of the good.
“That Cain was not killed, but bore in the sight of all men a mark of reprobation is, in any case, the lesson we should draw from the
Old Testament.“
- Albert Camus
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• Prescribes a sense of balance in the imposition of a just punishment.
• By metering out a fit punishment for the severity of the crime, it restores order.
• Lex Talionis admits limitations in punishment.
– We cannot justify brutality for brutality, rape for rape, torture for torture.
Lex Talionis “was an attempt to curb the spirit of vindication among God's people who would have sought to punish the guilty sevenfold by plucking out both eyes and knocking out several teeth… the law of talion does not command but limits revenge."
Bishop Sean O'Malley, OFM Cap
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

– Swift and certain.
• These criteria can also lead to an abuse of civil rights.
• Which, in turn, would lead to an increase in the number of innocent people executed.
– Broadcast to the population.
• We would have to implement televised executions.
If deterrence is going to be your justification for the death penalty, then ask yourselves why you are appalled at the idea of public executions?
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• The deterring factor is uncertain.
• Research neither supports or refutes the deterring factor of capital punishment.
• Deterrence is an appeal to Utilitarian Ethics.
• Catholic moral teaching does not accept the utilitarian method (if it works it must be good) as the sole basis for moral judgment.
• Catholic moral teaching is based upon human dignity.
• Our just response to every human person, who is created in the image of God.
“Life is a gift that the Lord has given us, and we must protect it from conception until natural death… God has given us life, and only can
God take it away … the death sentence is not a natural death.”
Cardinal Renato Martino,
President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• The Death Penalty is 100% effective in protecting society against the criminal, and any further criminal action he might take.
• The Church recognizes the authority of the State to implement the death penalty.
“It is in no way contrary to the commandment ‘thou shalt not kill' … for the representative of the State's authority to put criminals to death.“
St. Agustine
But is it still necessary?
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• Improved penal systems.
– We are able to secure society through improved, maximum security prisons.
• The Catechism was rewritten to emphasize this teaching:
– "If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they correspond to the concrete conditions of the Common Good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person."
"The Death penalty is only appropriate in cases of absolute necessity, in other words, when it could not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today, however, as a result of steady improvement in the organization of the penal system, such cases are rare, if not practically non-existent."
Evangelium Vitae
Pope John
Paul II
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• In the past, the death penalty was used as a religious punishment.
– Even the worst criminal examined his own conscience when faced with the actuality of execution. He repented, and accepted a penance (even a penance of death imposed on him by the legitimate power of the State) which prepared him for God's perfect judgment.
– The authority of the State, sanctioned by the Church, is to execute the criminal with love and hope of redemption. But for this practice to be truly authentic, the society must believe in the existence of a transcendent order of justice, which the
State has an obligation to protect.
“Belief in the immortality of the soul has permitted Catholicism to formulate the problem of Capital Punishment in very different terms, and justify it.”
- Albert Camus
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• Rehabilitation, as the word is used today, has no part in the Death Penalty's justification.
– Today, the State is generally viewed simply as an instrument of the will of the governed. In this modern perspective, the death penalty expresses, not the divine judgment on objective evil, but rather the collective anger of the group, as a self-assertive act of vengeance, which is always sinful.
“But what does such a justification mean to the society we live in, a society which in its institutions and manners alike has become almost entirely secular? When an atheist
– or skeptic – or agnostic judge imposes the death penalty on an unbelieving criminal, he is pronouncing a definitive punishment that cannot be revised. He sits upon God's throne, but without possessing God's powers and, moreover, without believing in them.”
- Albert Camus
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

• Punishment should be used to restore order and good in society.
• Punishment must not impose too great an evil on the wrongdoer.
• What are the evils of Capital Punishment?
“Execution is the opposite of baptism into a community. Baptism into a community means `We are all connected, we are all one family and you are part of us.' And execution is removing a person from the human family, step by step, saying, `You are no longer part of us. You are not human, like we are, and so we can terminate you."
Sr. Helen Prejean, CSJ
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The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective

•
Capital Punishment is irrevocable.
– Mistakes can be made against the innocent. Recent DNA studies show that instances of innocent people being executed is as high as 15%.
•
Justice is not sure.
– Imposition of the death penalty is racially biased.
• Causes great anguish.
– Not only for the condemned, but for their families, and for those who must carry out the sentence.
•
Whets the appetite for revenge, not justice, and begets violence.
– Studies show a substantial increase in violent crimes following a highly publicized execution.
•
Fosters a casual attitude toward death.
– For some, the notion that we can lawfully kill in some instances, cheapens the value of life in all instances and in all forms.
Andy Warhol
"Among the individuals and groups against legalized abortion in the United States, there are some who support the continuation of capital punishment. This is an inconsistency and an unacceptable contradiction.”
Cardinal Fiorenzo Angelini
The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective
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• The Death Penalty is an act of despair.
– We admit a sense of lost hope for the criminal we condemn to death.
– We despair of the very rehabilitative ends we use to justify our action.
– When we surrender to hopelessness, it's not only the criminal's ability to change and make retribution for his crime that we reject, but we reject the very action of grace in the life of the condemned.
Andy Warhol
… And that should be very troubling to us.
The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective
Alyosha.com

• Life and freedom are the gifts we receive from our Creator, and they are the quintessential qualities of our human dignity.
– This is the underlying truth that sustains Catholic moral teaching. The consistent ethic of life, which Cardinal Bernardin advocated, is based on this concept of human dignity, that every human life is sacred and inviolable.
• For the sake of the security of society, we may revoke certain freedoms and incarcerate criminals. We may punish by bloodless means.
• But for the sake of human dignity, and in the hope of redemption and grace, we ought not to take human life; not even the guiltiest.
“The new evangelization calls for followers of Christ who are unconditionally pro-life: who will proclaim, celebrate and serve the Gospel of life in every situation. A sign of hope is the increasing recognition that the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil. Modern society has the means of protecting itself without definitively denying criminals the chance to reform. I renew the appeal I made most recently at Christmas for a consensus to end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.”
Andy Warhol
The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective
Pope John Paul II
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A Call for the Abolition of the Death Penalty: A Statement by the
Washington State Catholic Conference, 1998 – Archbishop
Alex J. Brunett, Bishop William S. Skylstad, Bishop Carlos A.
Sevilla
Official Statement of Washington State Bishops
U.S. Catholic Bishops' Statement on Capital Punishment – U.S.
Catholic Conference 1980
Official Statement of U.S. Bishops
The Pope's Statement – From Evangelium Vitae – Pope John Paul
II, 1995
Encyclical Statement from John Paul II
The Death Penalty in Our Time – Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, 1985
The Paramount U.S. Catholic Statement against the Death
Penalty, from which arises the "consistent ethic of life" and
"seamless garment" positions.
Catholicism and Capital Punishment – Avery Cardinal Dulles
Catholic-Historical-Conservative Perspective
Witness to Life: The Catholic Church and the Death Penalty –
Cardinal Roger Mahoney
Current Reflections in Light of Statement by JPII
Take the Higher Road – Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua
Brief article outlining traditional teachings and new perspectives
The Gospel of Life vrs. The Death Penalty – Most Rev. Sean
O'Malley, OFM Cap. 1999
Excellent synthesis of current Catholic thought
FRONTLINE: Angel on Death Row (Interview Script) – Sister
Helen Prejean. C.S.J.
Script of Frontline Production
A Catholic Lawyer Argues Against the Death Penalty – Kevin
Doyle
Personal Reflections-Sociologicial-Experiencial
Marianist Social Justice Collaborative Death Penalty Issue Team
Proposal – Marianists
Marianist Perspective and Proposal Against the Death Penalty
Resistance, Rebellion, and Death: Reflections on the Guillotine –
Albert Camus, 1957
Secular Position Against the Death Penalty, with Insights into the
Catholic Perspective
Declaration of Life – That the Death Penalty not be Sought in the
Event of My Violent Death
Link
Andy Warhol Alyosha.com
The Death Penalty
A Catholic Perspective