It's Wrong to Execute Saddam -- Catholic Church
Yesterday, the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Cardinal Renato Martino, said of the death sentence imposed on Saddam Hussein, "You cannot punish the crime with another crime, because the death sentence is a crime." An hour ago, the chair of the Catholic Bishops鈥 Irish Commission for Justice and Social Affairs, Bishop Raymond Field, released the following statement expressing his moral objection to the execution of the former Iraqi leader.
Press Release 鈥 7 November 2006 - Immediate
Catholic Bishops鈥 Commission for Justice and Social Affairs statement on the death sentence imposed on Saddam Hussein by the Iraqi High Tribunal
"Let us pray for a satisfactory and speedy end to armed hostilities in the country and region"
鈥 Bishop Field
The chair of the Catholic Bishops鈥 Irish Commission for Justice and Social Affairs (ICJSA), Bishop Raymond Field, today disagreed with the verdict of death by hanging which has been imposed on Saddam Hussein for crimes against humanity.
Bishop Field said: 鈥淚 disagree with the Iraqi High Tribunal鈥檚 verdict, on Sunday, of the death sentences imposed on Saddam Hussein and some of his colleagues. While the court found him guilty of crimes against humanity for ordering hundreds of Shias killed or tortured in the town of Dujail in 1982, it is contrary to the common good that he and his colleagues should be executed in this case.鈥
Bishop Field continued: 鈥淚 fully endorse the words of the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Cardinal Renato Martino, who said on Vatican Radio yesterday evening: 鈥業 am reacting as I react to any death sentence. You cannot punish the crime with another crime, because the death sentence is a crime. Although it is the State who discerns it, the State is not the owner of the life of its citizens. Life is a gift from the moment of conception to the natural end, so a death sentence is not a natural end. I say that because John Paul II in [his 1995 Encyclical Letter] Evangelium Vitae, said that, now, today, society has all the means to render a criminal innocuous without applying the death sentence. And so, in particular to the situation in Iraq, I don鈥檛 think that it will make better the situation in that country.鈥欌
Bishop Field concluded: 鈥淚t is clear from the public response to the Tribunal鈥檚 verdict that its decision has further polarised Shia and Sunni Iraqis. Furthermore, society in Iraq has never been more dysfunctional and those who suffer most in these circumstances are ordinary Iraqi people. Let us remember in our prayers those who have suffered injury and death during this conflict, from all sides, and let us pray also for a satisfactory and speedy end to armed hostilities in the country and region鈥.
ENDS
Notes for Editors
脴 Log on to www.catholicjustice.ie for more information on the Irish Commission for Justice and Social Affairs (ICJSA).
脴 The ICJSA is a Commission of the Irish Bishops鈥 Conference. It was launched by Dr Se谩n Brady, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland, on 13 June 2005.
脴 The ICJSA is chaired by Dr Raymond Field, Auxiliary Bishop of Dublin. The Commission is part of the Department of Social Issues and International Affairs of the Irish Bishops鈥 Conference which is chaired by Dr Diarmuid Martin, Archbishop of Dublin.
脴 The role of the ICJSA is to support the Irish Bishops鈥 Conference in promoting the social teaching of the Church and to advise on issues of social concern both nationally and internationally.
Comments
Congratulations to the Catholic Bishops for their leadership on this. They are right. Wrong is wrong is wrong and it doesn't matter if the person is Saddam or Hitler or George W Bush.
As a Catholic, the present Governor of Virginia opposes capital punishment, but during his election campaign he assured the people of the state, the majority of whom support the death penalty, that he would carry out the law, subject to the power of pardon which he can exercise in unusual cases.