✣ Pope: update Catechism on death penalty
What happened? Pope Francis said that the death penalty “is, in itself, contrary to the Gospel.” At an event in the Vatican to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Catechism, Francis said that capital punishment is “inadmissible, because it attacks the inviolability and dignity of the person”. The Catechism expressed strong disapproval of the death penalty, but said that Church teaching did not entirely rule it out. Pope Francis said the Catechism might have to be updated. What the media said Theologian John Cavadini told CNN that he was pleased. “I admire Pope Francis’s call for the abolition of the death penalty as a contribution to the seamless garment of pro-life ethics. State killing is not in keeping with the purposes of punishment or the norms of human dignity,” Cavadini said. In the Guardian, Joanna Moorhead said there might be more controversy ahead. “Talk is now swirling in Rome that Francis means to overturn Catholic teaching on the ‘just war’ theory. He has already made statements that, for example, ‘faith and violence are incompatible’, and has spoken out many times against war,” Moorhead said. If the Pope decided to “change Catholic teaching” on the matter, she added, “he will put the cat well and truly among the pigeons” – and not only within the Church. What the blogosphere said Hold on, said Edward Feser at catholicherald.co.uk. The Pope can’t change teaching – as the First Vatican Council put it, the Pope is not supposed to “make known some new doctrine”. Several passages in the Bible “teach the legitimacy of capital punishment”, and the Fathers and Doctors of the Church – as well as every pope who has spoken on the subject – have said the death penalty is in theory permitted. A “clarification” is in order, Feser said. At LMSchairman.com, Joseph Shaw argued that the Pope needed no clarification: his words clearly contradicted previous popes. Pius XII, for instance, taught that a criminal could be executed “when, by his crime, he has already disposed himself of his right to live”. So either Pius or Francis must have been wrong – which means that ultramontanism has become “absurd”.
