In the following article, I will attempt to bring to evidence, by appealing to Scripture, tradition and reason, and stressing the insights of St. Thomas Aquinas and Immanuel Kant [Ed’s note: while the Catholic Church has condemned Kant’s liberal system of philosophy, nevertheless, his quotes are important as they show remarkable support for capital punishment from one of the most influential apologists of liberalism], that capital punishment is a just and therefore charitable punishment because:

The defense of the death penalty will be clustered around three arguments against capital punishment in vogue among Catholics. I will state the objections to the death penalty in the form of propositions. They should be recognizable to anyone even remotely acquainted with the subject of capital punishment.

Conversely, the sacred writer implies that the failure to ratify capital punishment when a man is murdered bespeaks a lack of reverence for man as an image of God. The preciousness of the person, his dignity, his ontological value qua person ―which the murderer blatantly disregards ―is not esteemed unless the villain is put to death. That man is made in the image of God is a gift of priceless value. Genesis 9:6 warns us, albeit indirectly, that the worth of the gift is grossly underestimated when the murderer is allowed to live.

Apropos of society's willingness to discard the death penalty, it is incontrovertible that such a desire cannot be adduced as indicative of an increased appreciation of the value of human life. On the contrary, the demand for the abolition of capital punishment is a sign of blindness, not appreciation; for the diabolical consequences of our irreverent attitude toward human life are myriad. Since the Roe vs. Wade decision, some twenty million babies have been murdered. Pornography in all its satanic forms permeates society. Suicide is a national plague. The many abuses in the realm of sex are omnipresent. Euthanasia is not without its proponents and practitioners. In light of this moral wasteland, the assertion that abolitionists witness to modern man's recognition of the value of life is preposterous.

According to the traditional teaching of theologians, God is reflected in His creatures in the following ways: as a trace (vestigium), which is characteristic of all material entities; as an image (imago), which is characteristic of spiritual beings in their natural state; and as a likeness (similitudo), which is characteristic of spiritual beings in a supernatural state. For example, man's body is a trace; his soul, lacking grace is a divine image; and his soul perfected by grace, is a divine likeness.

Man is an image of God because of the rational soul’s powers of intellect, will, and love. He is able to grasp truth. choose the good, and love all that is true, good, and beautiful. These three powers ―intellectual, volitional, and affective constitute man as an image of God. Divine likeness is achieved only in the state of grace, when "a partaker of the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4).

Indeed, the soul is man’s crowning glory. So precious is our soul that it is worth the blood of the Son of God. We have been redeemed "...not with perishable things, with silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, as a lamb without blemish and without spot" (I Peter 1: 18-19).

On their side [the heretics'] is the sin whereby they have deserved, not only to be separated from the Church by excommunication but also to be banished from the world by death. For it is a much heavier offense to corrupt the faith, whereby the life of the soul is sustained, than to tamper with the coinage, which is an aid to temporal life. Hence if coiners, or other malefactors, are at once handed over by secular princes to die a just death, much more may heretics, immediately after they are convicted of heresy, be not only excommunicated, but also justly done to die. (Summa Theologica [here after ST], IIa IIae, q. 11, art. 3)

The person is not taken seriously as a spiritual creature, as a divine image, if heretics, who "corrupt the faith, whereby the life of the soul is sustained," are not punished ―dare I say it? ―with excommunication. What greater crime is there than the spiritual harm caused by heretics? Yet these contumacious individuals are not even admonished. In fact, they are the putative heroes of the day. Instead of being extirpated they are held in high esteem for their perfidiousness.

The Church hierarchy stresses the dignity of the person in many of its official pronouncements. Fine. They point out that the main duty of public authorities is to protect the community and the common good. Great. But Church officials do not provide a good example when they permit nefarious Church members to cause unbridled scandal in their own domain. To avoid the charge of hypocrisy, the guardians of the Catholic Faith should be solicitous for the spiritual well-being of Catholics before expecting secular authorities to administer to the common good.

If however, he has committed a murder, he must die. In this case, there is no substitute that will satisfy the requirements of legal justice. There is no sameness of kind between death and remaining alive even under the most miserable conditions, and consequently there is also no equality between the crime and the retribution unless the criminal is judicially condemned and put to death...

It may also be pointed out that no one has ever heard of anyone condemned to death on account of murder who complained that he was getting too much punishment and therefore was being treated unjustly; everyone would laugh in his face if he were to make such a statement. (translated as The Metaphysical Elements of Justice, New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1965, pp. 104, 106)

When the proper authority punishes ―an instance of forceful correction, according to Saint Thomas ―it is an act of justice. Needless to say, the act is good, too, since it is an act and perfection of virtue.

Examined from the point of view of the one punished, punishment is a physical evil; pondered from the side of the authority empowered to punish, however, punishment is a good.

St. Thomas Aquinas emphasizes the purgatorial power of punishment too. The Common Doctor avers that punishment orders guilt: retribution has as its object the maintenance or restoration of justice and order in the soul. For this reason he holds that punishment is an act of virtue (ST, IIa, q. 12, art. 2).

One popular argument against capital punishment also recommends that punishment be abolished altogether in favor of forgiveness. I will now consider this objection.

However, these words of Christ, which are often cited by the abolitionists as supportive of their position regarding capital punishment, refer to the offended individual, not to the State. As Dietrich von Hildebrand has shown, only the injured person (or someone closely related to the person) can forgive the objective evil done to him or her. In other words, the formal object of human forgiveness is the objective evil for the person; the wrong inflicted on the individual. The pardon refers to the evil intention of the villain inasmuch as it has the negative importance of an objective evil for the person. Note, however, that this does not mean the moral disvalue of the criminal's act is pardoned by the injured person; for only God (or His representatives on earth whom He has empowered to "bind and loose") can forgive this aspect of the morally evil act.

Hence for Christians to suggest that the State should pardon the evildoer is to ask for something which is metaphysically impossible for the State to perform. The situation is akin to affirming that contradictory judgments can both be true: the words can be said but the judgment can never correspond to reality. Similarly, the State can make a declaration of forgiveness, but the act can never be exercised in reality.

And so the State has as its goal the perfection of persons, which in turn makes possible the perfect State. According to St. Thomas, the end of the State ―the perfect State ―is realized when men are living virtuous lives. Moreover, the virtuous life is lived by adhering to the dictates of the natural moral law; such adherence is a divine good insofar as it is a participation in the eternal law (ST, Ia IIae, q. 94, art. 2).

Hence inasmuch as the State guards the common good by sentencing a man to death, it is acting justly. As St. Thomas puts it:

Granted, there are criminal acts which cannot be punished "eye for an eye" Two such acts are bestiality and rape. When the law of retribution cannot be strictly applied, the villain should suffer "that which according to the spirit of the penal law ―even if not to the letter thereof ―is the same as what he has inflicted on others," Kant rightly asserts (op. cit., p. 133).

In the Old Testament the law of retribution is sanctioned in Exodus 21:23-25, and in Lev. 24:17-21. In addition, the law proclaimed on Mount Sinai ratified the death penalty for the following crimes:

So seriously does Kant take the concept of due relation between crime and punishment ―and this is as it should be ―that he correctly asserts:

Thus when we cease to consider what the criminal deserves and consider only what will cure him or deter others, we have tacitly removed him from the sphere of justice altogether; instead of a person, a subject of rights, we now have a mere object, a patient, a 'case'.

Moreover, if curing the criminal or deterring others are the only considerations, then the doctrine of determinism is tacitly, if not explicitly, introduced. You see, criminals cannot be punished because man is not free; he is the product of circumstances; the plaything of experiences. What he wills he cannot help but will; for his character has been determined by irrational factors such as upbringing, social and economic conditions, psychological and biological considerations, and the like. Man does not determine his character; his character is the result of experiences and circumstances beyond his control.

The determinist cannot use words like "deplorable," "wicked," "shameful," and "disgraceful" to describe heinous acts because these words make sense only if the criminal is free to choose between good and evil, and therefore is responsible for his actions.

If the determinist recommends punishment it is to cure the offender, or to use him to deter others –sometimes both –but never as a means of retribution for criminal acts. Therefore the criminal is treated as something less than a person. And to consider the criminal in this manner is to remove him from the realm of justice altogether. Justice presupposes a person; an animal or an inanimate object can neither possess the perfection of justice nor be the object of it.

Although the bishops concede that support of the death penalty is not incompatible with the teachings of Catholicism, they maintain ―and want Catholics to maintain ―that it is more appropriate as Catholics, more in keeping with the commands of Christ, to advocate abolition of the death penalty. Are not the bishops guilty of double-think? They fail to realize that if their arguments against capital punishment are valid, then support of the death penalty is unjust, uncharitable, and unchristian. One thing is certain: When the bishops speak individually on the subject of capital punishment, they clearly assert that to uphold the death penalty is incompatible with the principles of the Catholic Faith.

The bishops’ failure to uphold the death penalty is yet another example of their propensity to reject the traditional teaching of the Church. Unfortunately, many Catholics follow their lead. Thus the ever-increasing phenomenon of considering both the Church itself and Catholics who defend her teaching, as unchristian.