I WAS not immediately jubilant when news came out that Pope Francis changed Roman Catholic teaching on death penalty. What came to mind instead were questions which I suppose were studied and discussed prior to the Holy Father’s pronouncement.
If I may mention a few important questions that require serious answers in relation to the Church’s new teaching: will there be no room for theological dissent? How about Catholics who still believe that “in certain cases” death penalty is necessary? If conscience is the highest arbiter in moral matters (and not authority) then what about Catholic politicians who would invoke their freedom of conscience and thus insist that in certain cases death penalty should be imposed? As a parenthetical remark, the “nature of the controversy”, if we may call it, is basically similar to what Catholics went through at the height of the reproductive health law issue.
As always, the Church can be easily united in questions of dogmatic truth (e.g. Immaculate Conception, Virgin Birth, Divinity of Christ). Unfortunately, it is not always the case in the area of morality. Moral decision-making is not just about adherence to authority or infallible teaching. It also requires the exercise of freedom and the formation of conscience. That is why in the personal level, “sins” may have the same names or labels but, seriously, we cannot but leave it up to God to determine the exact or definite culpability or immorality each and every sinner has.
My reflections on the issue prompted me to send a private message to my moral theology professor, Aloysius Lopez Cartagenas. I turned to him as someone who is more trained and thus an authority in the field. I only expected him to say an opinion on the issue. He gave me instead his views which I find worth sharing.
The rejection of death penalty, he said, “is long overdue.” And although this development in doctrine deserves our affirmation, my former professor said that “the medium wasn’t the best.” He explained that the rejection of death penalty should have been “contextualized in the larger evil of violence in all its forms including state-sponsored or sanctioned (violence).” He added further that, “an encyclical on violence would have been forceful as death penalty is not merely a catechetical item.” The last part of his reply is for me most important: “rejection of death penalty only makes sense in (situations where there is) a culture of violence.”
I remember what another professor told me: we cannot say at all times that the value of life is absolute. Otherwise, martyrdom and heroism do not have any meaning. The rejection of death penalty should be highlighted not by repeating the same old chorus on the sanctity of life. The whole argument against killing as a form of legal sanction cannot be separated from a necessary critique of unjust social structures and above all the proliferation of violence caused by political systems that breed inequity.
Apparently, a papal signature will not silence those who believe in the necessity of death penalty in certain circumstances. Catholics who favor death penalty would do all that they can to defend their case. They might even bring back to life the Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas if only to insist on the moral justifiability of capital punishment as a form of legitimate defense on the part of the State.
I would like to end though with what my astute moral theology professor A.L. Cartagenas also said on this issue: “the bigger task of the Church is not to rewrite the Catechism on the issue but to be a catalyst of a culture of non-violence in this world.” Hopefully, the development does not end in and with the doctrine.