The Vatican and Saddam
I saw a story in the Google news today ... FACTBOX-How will Saddam Hussein be hanged?.
And also saw this story ... Top Vatican official condemns Saddam's death penalty
I don't get the chance to say this very often, so .... I agree with the Vatican.
And I agree with Michele Simone SJ, who is quoted in this news story - ‘Eye for an eye’ in Saddam death penalty wrong, Vatican official says ....
Jesuit Father Michele Simone, assistant director of La Civilta Cattolica, a Vatican-reviewed magazine, told Vatican Radio the sentence "certainly would not resolve the situation in Iraq." ... "In a situation like that of Iraq, where hundreds are, in fact, condemned to death each day" by the ongoing violence, "adding one more does not help anything," he said.
Father Simone said if Saddam had not been condemned to death, most Iraqis probably would have questioned the integrity of the trial "because death has become the order of the day. But to save a life – which does not mean accepting what Saddam Hussein did -- is always positive."
The Jesuit said the Iraqi government must find a political solution to promote and protect the lives of all its citizens and the value of human life in general.
And also saw this story ... Top Vatican official condemns Saddam's death penalty
I don't get the chance to say this very often, so .... I agree with the Vatican.
And I agree with Michele Simone SJ, who is quoted in this news story - ‘Eye for an eye’ in Saddam death penalty wrong, Vatican official says ....
Jesuit Father Michele Simone, assistant director of La Civilta Cattolica, a Vatican-reviewed magazine, told Vatican Radio the sentence "certainly would not resolve the situation in Iraq." ... "In a situation like that of Iraq, where hundreds are, in fact, condemned to death each day" by the ongoing violence, "adding one more does not help anything," he said.
Father Simone said if Saddam had not been condemned to death, most Iraqis probably would have questioned the integrity of the trial "because death has become the order of the day. But to save a life – which does not mean accepting what Saddam Hussein did -- is always positive."
The Jesuit said the Iraqi government must find a political solution to promote and protect the lives of all its citizens and the value of human life in general.
posted by crystal | 11:23 AM
6 Comments:
Hi Crystal. First of all I hope you had a blessed Christmas, and hope the New Year will be the best year that you have ever had.
I am somewhat saddened by Saddam's death, not because I don't think that he deserved it, but more because I think that he was used as a scape goat so that others wouldn't have to look hard at themselves. I suspect the current violence in Iraq may be worse that the violence that Saddam caused.
As for capital punishment, I am old enough to remember the Catholic Church's staunch defense of the practice when I was a teenager. And the asserted right of the state to impose the death penalty is still part of the Church teaching.
I think that the current argument is that we now have better ways of treating convicted criminals than imposing the death penalty, other ways of protecting society from further harm. I question that.
First prisoners do escape. And even if they bring the escape rate down to a level that protects you and me, what about the other prisoners that they are incarcerated with? We pretty much ignore the fact that prisoners get killed in prison, and raped, and beat up, etc. Or are we really saying that part of society doesn't deserve our protection. And remember, many of those in prison are not there for violent crimes.
There is another aspect of this that bothers me. I live in an area that has a lot of poverty, most people in this area do not have, and cannot afford medical insurance. The standard way of killing pain is often drinking, few have all their teeth. Yet if one of them is murdered, the murderer convicted and sent to prison, the victim's relatives are now forced to pay taxes to keep the murderer in prison, and to pay for all his medical bills, reasonable food, and possibly even better housing than they have. This is not an eye for an eye situation, it is having lost an eye they have to give another.
Somehow it doesn't seem like justice is being well served in these cases. I don't know what the answer is, Crystal, and maybe there really isn't a good answer. And I wonder if sometimes the death penalty is not a merciful thing. I shudder to think what Saddam's life would have been like if kept in an Iraqi prison. I note that he was kept in US hands to prevent "humiliation" before he was hung.
Personally I think that there are much worse things than death. And yet death is so final...
Perhaps if we all pray enough some of these problems will be solved in the New Year.
Hugs,
Mike L
Hi Mike,
It's good to hear from you - I hope you and your family also had and have a wonderful Christmas and New Year :-)
I agree with you about Saddam - he's a bad guy, of course, but his execution feels like a political ploy to take attention away from our own devistation of Iraq.
About capital punishment ...
prisons really are horrible places, and should be changed for the better, but I'm not sure killing the violent criminals is the best way to protect other prisoners from them ... maybe isolation?
about the cost, I seem to remember that it actually costs more to execute someone than to keep him imprisoned for life, strange as that sounds.
If one of my loved ones was murdered, I'd probably want the person who had done it to die, die, die! But perhaps it's a good thing that "justice" is more objective. For myself, I can sometimes imagine how easy it might be to end up having killed someone, and wish it hadn't happened, and wish I had time to repent or redeem myself.
Death is so final, and killing someone, even in a state sanctioned execution, seems like it would take a toll on those that do it. But I'm actually pretty mxed up about the issue - I watch TV and see the hero kill the bad guy, and say "yes!". But in real life, I don't even like to kill insects :-)
Hi Crystal,
I hope that you had a good Christmas, and I'm wishing good things for you this New Year.
Mike L. has a good and interesting summary, and it is true what he says about the Church's teaching during his youth, but it is a certainty that Pope JPII really moved the sticks on Capital Punishment. There was a great deal of movement and development in the teaching of the Catholic Church on this issue under his pontificate.
Regarding Saddam Hussein, I've been watching some of the various footage and have read some of the stories, and it seems that some of these hooded executioners were chanting sectarian Shia slogans and invoking the name of Moqtada Al Sadr just before the hanging.
In other words, this was really just another sectarian killing in Iraq's Civil War. I think it is extremely telling that the only thing this Al Maliki "government" in Iraq has been able to do with any efficiency and alacrity was to decide to kill somebody.
Hi Jeff,
I hope you guys had a good Christmas and will have a good New Year too :-)
And thanks for telling me about your vacation. I've never been to the East Coast except a quick stop once in New York. I think there's a big Jesuit retreat center near where you vacationed, on a bluff overlooking the sea, that was donated to them ... picures of the area are beautiful.
Yes, ditto on yout thoughts about Iraq.
I think there's a big Jesuit retreat center near where you vacationed, on a bluff overlooking the sea
I believe that would be the Gonzaga Eastern Point Retreat House in Gloucester.
I haven't been there, but the Cape Ann area is beautiful too, especially Rockport, one of my favorite places in New England. Last April Anne and I got a babysitter for the weekend and spent a weekend alone up there. It was the first time we'd been alone somewhere in about 11 or 12 years.
Jeff,
yes, that's the place - thanks for the link. I read about it in that book. My Life With The Saints.
You and Anne need more vacations! :-)
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