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The Pope’s remarks on capital punishment need to be
clarified
by posted Sunday, 15 Oct 2017
Pope Francis speaks at the Vatican on the 25th anniversary of the Catechism of the Catholic Church
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anniversary of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The press has been reporting that
the Pope called for a change to the Church’s traditional teaching on capital punishment.
Some of his remarks do indeed seem to imply that. However, other remarks in the same address
point in the opposite direction. Taken as a whole, the Pope’s remarks make his position on
capital punishment very unclear.
O n October 11, Pope Francis gathered to celebrate the 25"T Church’s traditional teaching on capital
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orthodoxy when he required the Waldensian heretics to affirm its legitimacy as a condition of
their reentry into the Church. The Roman Catechism issued under Pope St Pius V solemnly taught
the legitimacy of capital punishment, as did the catechism issued under Pope St Pius X. Pope
Pius XII affirmed the legitimacy of capital punishment on several occasions, and taught that a
murderer has, by virtue of his crime, “deprived himself of the right to live.”
inishment up to Benedict XVI has
Even Pope St John Paul II explicitly reaffirmed in the Catechism he promulgated that “the
traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty” under certain
conditions. It is true that John Paul thought that capital punishment was in practice best avoided,
but this was a non-binding prudential judgment rather than a doctrinal matter. Cardinal
Ratzinger, John Paul I's doctrinal spokesman and later to become Pope Benedict XVI, made this
clear when he stated in 2004 that:
Ifa Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment...he
would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion.
While the Church exhorts civil authorities... to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing
punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to...have recourse to capital
punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about...
applying the death penalty. [Emphasis added}
But mightn’t a pope reverse Scripture and his predecessors on such a matter? He may not. While
the First Vatican Council taught that a pope is infallible when he speaks ex cathedra, it also
insisted that
The Holy Spirit was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by his
revelation, make known some new doctrine, but that, by his assistance, they might religiously
guard and faithfully expound the revelation or deposit of faith transmitted by the apostles.
Ina 2005 homily, Pope Benedict XVI reiterated the point, saying:
The Pope is not an absolute monarch whose thoughts and desires are law... He must not proclaim
his own ideas, but rather constantly bind himself and the Church to obedience to God's Word, in the
face of every attempt to adapt it or water it down
The Pope knows that in his important decisions, he is bound...to the binding interpretations
that have developed throughout the Church’s pilgrimage.
This is only the tip of the iceberg. In our book By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense
of Capital Punishment, Joseph Bessette and I assemble a mountain of evidence from Scripture,the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, the popes, saints and theologians, and catechisms and
other Church documents, that shows conclusively that the legitimacy of capital punishment is
irreformable Catholic teaching. And if that is so, then it follows that a pope who taught that,
capital punishment was always and intrinsically wrong would be as manifestly guilty of
doctrinal error as he would be if he denied the Trinity. (Such doctrinal error is possible when a
pope is not speaking ex cathedra, though it is extremely rare. There are only a handful of
examples in the history of the Church of popes who have possibly been guilty of this, the best
known cases being those of Pope Honorius and Pope John XXII.)
So, did Pope Francis propose reversing this traditional teaching? Some of his remarks seem to
imply that. For example, he says that capital punishment “is per se contrary to the Gospel.” That
gives the impression that capital punishment is wrong, not merely under certain circumstances,
but intrinsically or of its very nature - something no previous pope, including John Paul Il, has
ever taught. This impression is reinforced by Pope Francis’s further statements that “no one
ought to be deprived... of life,” that “no matter how serious the crime that has been committed,
the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and the dignity of
the person,” and that traditional arguments in defense of capital punishment “now appear
clearly contrary to the new understanding of Christian truth.”
The Pope also indicates that “a more adequate and coherent treatment” of the death penalty
would take a more negative attitude toward it than even the Catechism issued by John Paul II
did. Now, the Catechism already includes a prudential judgment to the effect that under
contemporary circumstances capital punishment should be “very rare, if not practically
nonexistent.” If Pope Francis thinks that even this does not convey a sufficiently negative view
of capital punishment, then it is not clear what he thinks should be added unless he advocates a
complete condemnation of the death penalty even in principle,
To be sure, Pope Francis also says that “in past centuries, when means of defence were scarce
and society had yet to develop and mature as it has, recourse to the death penalty appeared to
be the logical consequence of the correct application of justice.” He contrasts this with “the new
demands of upholding personal dignity” which hold “nowadays.” That might be taken to imply
that it is only under contemporary circumstances that capital punishment should be abolished,
and that it was legitimate in previous eras. However, in the very same passage he says:
Sadly, even in the Papal States recourse was had to this extreme and inhumane remedy that
ignored the primacy of mercy over justice. Let us take responsibility for the past and recognize that
the imposition of the death penalty was dictated by a mentality more legalistic than Christian.
Concern for preserving power and material wealth led to an over-estimation of the value of the law
and prevented a deeper understanding of the Gospel.
This makes it sound as if capital punishment was not in fact justifiable even in the past, and that
itis only theological error and base motives ~a “legalistic” mentality and “concern for
preserving power and material wealth” - that led Catholics of the past to think otherwise.
Jf this is what the Pope is saying, then the significance of his remarks cannot be overstated. For
one thing, it would seem gravely unjust, indeed scandalous, to suggest that the previous popes,
saints, and Fathers and Doctors of the Church who supported capital punishment were
motivated by “legalism” and a “concern for preserving power and material wealth,” and that
they lacked a deep understanding of the Gospel. No one who has actually studied what they had
to say on the subject could believe for a moment that they had anything but the highest motives
and a deep understanding of Scripture and tradition.
For another thing, ifthe Pope is saying that capital punishment is always and intrinsically
immoral, then he would be effectively saying - whether consciously or unconsciously - that
previous popes, Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and even divinely inspired Scripture are in
error. I/this is what he is saying, then he would be attempting to “make known some new
doctrine,” which the First Vatican Council expressly forbids a pope from doing. He would,
contrary to the teaching of Pope Benedict XVI, be “proclaim[ing] his own ideas” rather than