Capital Punishment Q & A: The Church's Teaching

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Capital Punishment
Question from Andrew Tremel on 10-24-2002:

Dear Sir,

Andrew Tremel

Answer by Fr.Stephen F. Torraco on 10-24-2002:

It is unfortunate that in recent times the Church's teaching on capital punishment has been presented so unclearly, both by members of the Church as well as of the media and other sectors of society. The Church's teaching on this matter is governed primarily by the natural law, and secondly by the principle of double effect. The Church's teaching on this matter remains fundamentally the same. The Church has always taught that it is the right and responsibility of the legitimate temporal authority to defend and preserve the common good, and more specifically to defend citizens against the aggressor. This defense against the aggressor, by virtue of the principle of double effect, can resort to the death penalty. The point here is that the death penalty is understood as an act of self-defense on the part of civil society. In more recent times, Pope John Paul II has taught that the need for such self-defense to resort to the death penalty is "rare, if not virtually nonexistent." The important point here is that the Pope has not, as he cannot, change the constant and fundamental teaching of the Church on this matter, based as it is on the natural law, namely that it is the right and responsibility of the legitimate temporal authority to defend citizens against the aggressor. What the Pope IS saying is that, in modern society, the modern penal system, along with an intense anti-life culture, makes resorting to the death penalty *disproportionate* to the threatening aggression. (According to the 4th criterion of the principle of double effect, the unintended evil effect of the act of self defense has to be proportionate to the intended good effect of that act.) Thus, while the Pope is saying that the burden of proving the need for the death penalty in specific cases should rest on the shoulders of the legitimate temporal authority, it remains true that the legitimate temporal authority alone has the authority to determine if and when a "rare" case arises that warrants the death penalty. It would, by the standards of the natural law and the principle of double effect, be morally irresponsible to rule out all such possibilities a priori, just as it would be morally irresponsible to apply the death penalty indiscriminately. For these reasons, the Church cannot possibly embrace EITHER a totally PRO-capital punishment teaching OR a totally ANTI-capital punishment teaching.

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