The Church's pro-life message is universal
Friday, Apr. 01, 2016
By Jean Hill
Director, Diocese of Salt Lake City Office of Life, Justice and Peace
The Catholic ethic of life is beautifully consistent. In its simplest form, it is a belief that every person’s life should be protected from conception to natural death. There are no caveats in this about guilt or innocence, no human judgements required about the worth of the individual person – every life must be protected.
Which is why I was saddened to see self-described “pro-life” advocates leave a recent legislative committee meeting midway between discussions on two important life issues. Within a single committee meeting, legislators heard a bill to provide anesthesia for the unborn child in an abortion and a bill to repeal the death penalty. These bills were heard back to back. The room was packed and several individuals representing different groups, all claiming to be pro-life, spoke passionately in support of the fetal pain bill, which passed.
As the committee moved to the next item on its agenda, repeal of the death penalty, however, most of the pro-life advocates exited the room.
There may have been many individual reasons people left, including the valid excuse that they did not expect the meeting to last as long as it did. From the “pro-life advocates” who spoke against the bill at this and other debates about the repeal of the death penalty, however, it became very apparent that many people do not want to be seen protecting the lives of those who inflict great harm on others.
This is an understandable sentiment, but the challenge of Catholicism is our deep-seated belief in protecting the most vulnerable, least sympathetic outcasts in any society.
Jesus is our shining example. He was the ultimate counter-cultural figure in his time, befriending prostitutes and tax collectors, touching lepers, speaking of the poor and downtrodden as cherished heirs to the kingdom of God. He went so far as to forgive those who tortured and killed him, in the midst of that very process.
We mere humans, on the other hand, occasionally speak with glee about torturing and killing others. Within many recent political discussions, including those on the repeal of the death penalty, public officials, political candidates and voters have expressed an abiding desire to see those who commit murder suffer unspeakable torment for their crimes.
This may be a natural human reaction to tales of horror, but such violent responses to violence are not supported in Catholic social doctrine. A faithful response to acts of aggression must be to protect all life, even the lives of the perpetrators, except in the most extraordinary situations where the lives of others can only be protected by taking the life of the perpetrator.
Even in such rare circumstances, our teaching does not permit the use of torture in any circumstance or allow for barbaric punishments as acts of revenge. The Catholic Catechism permits use of the death penalty only if it is the sole means to protect public safety, never as a mechanism for vengeance.
Catholicism is not for the faint-hearted. Our role models – Jesus, the apostles, the saints – were more often than not seen as subversives, in league with undesirable populations. As Pope Francis reminds us, “To love God and neighbor is not something abstract, but profoundly concrete: It means seeing in every person and face of the Lord to be served, to serve him concretely” [emphasis added].
In our teaching, Pope Francis says, “There is no human life more sacred than another, just as there is no human life qualitatively more significant than another.” It is our mission to serve all, to love all, to protect all, regardless of their perceived merits.
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