[Mb-civic] The Pope's 'Seismic Shift'

[ean at sbcglobal.net]

Published on Monday, April 4, 2005 by The Nation
The Pope's 'Seismic Shift'
by John Nichols
 http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0404-24.htm

Many of the most devout followers of the most famous of all victims of 
capital punishment, the Nazarene who was crucified on the Calvary 
cross, took a long time to recognize that state-sponsored execution is 
an affront to their history and their faith. For close to 1,500 years, the 
Catholic Church taught that the state had a right to punish criminals 
"by means of penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime, not 
excluding, in cases of extreme gravity, the death penalty."

For centuries, that line in the Catechism of the Catholic Church was 
used by Catholic politicians--and others who sought a moral 
justification for their actions--to place a veneer of legitimacy on even 
the most cavalier executions of the young, the mentally handicapped 
and the innocent. Even as Pope John Paul II moved the church closer 
and closer to explicit opposition to the death penalty during his long 
tenure, the loophole in the Catechism remained.

Then, in 1997, Sister Helen Prejean, the American nun and death 
penalty abolitionist who authored the book Dead Man Walking, asked 
Pope John Paul II to close the loophole. Late that year, the Pope 
removed the reference to the death penalty from the Catechism and, 
when he visited the United States two years later, he denounced the 
death penalty as "cruel and unnecessary." Referencing moves by 
countries around the world to ban capital punishment, the Pope 
declared in St. Louis that, "A sign of hope is the increasing recognition 
that the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the 
case of someone who has done great evil."

So pointed and passionate was the Pope's message on the issue that 
the then-governor of Missouri, Mel Carnahan, a Baptist and a 
supporter of capital punishment, commuted the sentence of a 
condemned man who was scheduled to be put to death by the state 
several weeks after the Papal visit.

It is to be expected that the death of a pope will be attended by 
hyperbole. And the passing on Saturday of John Paul II has proven to 
be no exception to the rule. The late pontiff has been credited with 
everything from defeating communism to healing the age-old rift 
between Catholics and Jews, just as he faces legitimate criticismfor 
everything from undermining the fight against AIDS by preaching 
against the use of condoms to consigning the women of the church to 
second-class citizenship.

The legacy of a pope who served twenty-six years, five months and 
seventeen days--longer than all the popes in history, save St. Peter 
and the nineteenth-century pontiff Pius IX--will, of course, be subject to 
debate. Wise souls will for centuries ponder the accomplishments and 
the missteps of the man who began his earthly journey as a Polish boy 
named Karol Jozef Wojtyla and ended it as one of the most recognized 
and respected figures in the world.

But one aspect of this pope's legacy is not up for debate. During John 
Paul II's pontificate, the Catholic Church closed the loophole that had 
served as all-too-many justifications for the taking of the lives of 
prisoners of the state. New Orleans Archbishop Francis Schulte said 
the change opened up "a whole new area (of consideration) for many 
Catholics." Sister Helen Prejean described it as a "Seismic shift" in 
church teaching. That shift had a profound influence on former Illinois 
Governor George Ryan, who declared the capital punishment system 
in Illinois "broken," and commuted the sentences of all 167 inmates 
sitting on death row in Illinois jails in 2003. And it continues to be felt 
today, as the US Conference of Catholic Bishops wages a newly 
launched national campaign to end the use of the death penalty in the 
United States.

There will be many grand eulogies to mark the passing of Pope John 
Paul II. But none will be more eloquent than the ongoing campaign to 
bar the barbaric practice of state-sponsored execution. Perhaps John 
Paul II was not the most modern pope, but he recognized the progress 
of society and moral teaching when he preached that, "Modern society 
has the means of protecting itself, without definitively denying criminals 
the chance to reform."

John Nichols, The Nation's Washington correspondent, has covered 
progressive politics and activism in the United States and abroad for 
more than a decade. He is currently the editor of the editorial page of 
Madison, Wisconsin's Capital Times.

© 2005 The Nation

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