Category: Theology

A reader writes:

I was hoping you could help me with a question I received from my JW brother.

He asked …….."Before Jesus came, What happened to good people when they died? What happened to bad people when they died?"

My belief was that the gates of heaven were open when Jesus died on the cross. However, where then did Elijah go when he was "taken up into heaven"….or Moses for that matter?

Any help would be appreciated.

The state of the typical soul before the time of Christ is not as clear as we would like since the Old Testament is not fully explicit about the matter and the New Testament sometimes says cryptical things about such souls.

It is clear that there was a belief in an afterlife among the Jewish people (contrary to what you hear from some folks today). This belief appears to be reflected in the oft-repeated formula used when someone died "and he was gathered to his people." The belief in the afterlife was so strong that God had to repeatedly warn the Jewish people not to go in for mediumship and necromancy (the channelling or calling up of the dead; cf. Deuteronomy 18).

Nevertheless, if God allowed, such things could happen, as in the famous incident in which Saul consults a medium ("the witch of Endor"–which later gave us the name "Endora" on the Bewitched show) who is able to successfully call up the dead prophet Samuel (who then tells Saul he’s doomed–DOOMED, I TELL YOU!!! So don’t mess with the dead–or Texas–unless you want to be doomed).

The place that the dead are referred to as going is called sh’ol (*not* "shee-oll"), but the meaning of the term is not entirely clear. It may just mean "the grave" but it also may mean "the netherworld." The dead are depicted as being conscious in sh’ol, but their lives there seem rather gloomy. In the Septuagint when hadEs (i.e., hades) is encountered it is normally representing sh’ol in the original Hebrew.

There is not the prospect of being united with God in heaven except in the case of certain rare individuals who are assumed directly into heaven, such as Enoch and Elijah (and maybe Moses). In their cases, the ordinary Hebrew word for "heaven"–sh’mayim–is used to describe where they went. They thus seem to be exceptions to the general rule that most folks didn’t get to go to heaven before Jesus.

(Why people find that concept hard to grasp, I don’t know, but I find myself having to repeatedly tell resistant callers on the radio that Enoch, Elijah, and mayby Moses are what we in the business refer to technically as "exceptions." Maybe it would be clearer if I called them teachers’ pets. *JOKE!*)

In any event, they seemed to get in early in anticipation of what Jesus would do on the cross whereas the rest of us get in afterward looking back at what he did. It’s the credit card/debit card difference.

Later in the Old Testament, as progressive revelation continues, we have the expectation of the resurrection come more to the fore (e.g., Dan 12:2). We also get more detail about what the intermediate state before the resurrection is like. For example, in 2 Maccabees Judah Maccabee has a vision of Jeremiah the prophet, who is praying for the people of Israel in the afterlife.

The most direct description of what the intermediate state we have at this time is actually found in the New Testament, when Jesus tells the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. In that parable Lazarus and Abraham are in a condition described as being one of comfort, while there is a gulf between them and the rich man, who is in torment. Thus the dead of this period seemed to occupy a position in sh’ol in which they enjoyed comfort but did not have the full beatific vision that they would enjoy after Christ.

Now a couple of tips since you mention your brother is a JW:

1) The book of Revelation describes what is going on in heaven now, in the age following Christ, and it repeatedly shows us folks who are conscious and praying and worshipping in heaven (e.g., the martyrs who have been killed).

2) JWs have a misperception of what Christians think heaven is. They have the idea that we think that after the resurrection we’ll leave earth in order to be in God’s presence up yonder. No. At the end of Revelation it is made clear that the new heavens and the new earth will be united, with the city of God coming down from heaven onto earth, so the heavenly, presence-of-God experience and the earthly paradisaical existence will both be enjoyed by the blessed at the same time for "the dwelling place of God [will be] with men." Here’s the text:

Revelation 21

2: And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband;
3: and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them;
4: he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away."

The reader also writes:

On another note, a protestant friend of mine suggested we watch the movie "Martin Luther" together. Have you seen this movie? I am a cradle catholic but hadn’t really embraced it until this past year but I am strong in my faith. Can anything good come of a situation like this?

Not much except maybe a good opportunity for you to evangelize your friend by showing him the way the film whitewashes Luther and distorts what really happened.

MORE INFO HERE.

A reader writes:

Jimmy – in reflecting on the recent Plenary Indulgence given by the Holy Father this year, and in reading some Catholic source books on Indulgences, there are a few points on which I’m unclear.  I’m wondering if you can help me.

1.  An Indulgence for the living can only be had by the one performing the indulgenced act.  In other words, I can’t ask for an Indulgence, Plenary or Partial, for another living person (other than myself). True?

2.  An Indulgence, being a species of sacramental, works "ex opere operantis"; in other words, its efficacy is dependent on the subjective disposition of the one performing the indulgenced act(s).  Is this true?

2.a Corollary question: do all voluntary acts of satisfaction, as ways of obtaining grace, work "ex opere operantis"?  If so, then penance assigned in the Sacrament of Confession (and performed) must work "ex opere operato", i.e., without its efficacy relying on the penitent’s subjective disposition.   True?

3.  An Indulgence is an act of the power of jurisdiction of a prelate (Pope, Bishop), not of the power of orders.  But since the Church has no jurisdiction over the dead, we cannot be sure that an Indulgence for the dead is efficacious.  Is this true?

A reader writes:

I enjoy listening to you on Catholic Answers radio and wanted to ask you a question or two. I am in RCIA because I was never confirmed in the Catholic faith. By this Easter, I will be about 8 months pregnant. Will receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation have any effect on my unborn baby? Now granted, John the Baptist might be the only exception, but I’ve wondered if my child could possibly receive some of the Holy Spirit as well?

Congratulations on your confirmation!

Regarding your baby, though, the Church would not teach that your confirmation would have any effect on him (or her). The sacraments are administered to particular persons, and your baby is a different person than you are, even though he’s snuggling (and punching and kicking) inside you right now.

Since your baby is (presumably) unbaptized (baptism in the womb being very rare, though possible), he wouldn’t be able to receive the sacrament of confirmation anyway, as baptism is the gateway to the other sacraments.

That being said, God might choose to bless your baby on the occasion of your confirmation, and you could always ask him to do so. Your baby will still need to be baptized and confirmed later on, though.

Also, why don’t we have any saints from the Old Testament (like St. Moses)?

The custom of putting "saint" in front of folks names started a long time ago when Christians would refer to the holiness of various individuals. Thus they would refer to "holy Mary," "holy John," or "holy Ignatius." So happens that the Latin word for "holy" is "sanctus," which also means "saint" (it can be either a noun or an adjective), so when these got translated into English, they would become "St. Mary," "St. John," and "St. Ignatius."

For some reason, this custom never really caught on when talking about Old Testament figures, presumably because the Christians who originated and fostered the custom were more focused on figures from the New Testament and more recen times than on the Old Testament. The Church does acknowledge certain Old Testament figures as being in heaven (e.g., Abraham, Moses, and Elijah), but the custom of calling them "St. Abraham," "St. Moses," and "St. Elijah" never really caught on. Just a quirk of the language.

Languages are funny that way.

A reader writes:

I enjoy listening to you on Catholic Answers radio and wanted to ask you a question or two. I am in RCIA because I was never confirmed in the Catholic faith. By this Easter, I will be about 8 months pregnant. Will receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation have any effect on my unborn baby? Now granted, John the Baptist might be the only exception, but I’ve wondered if my child could possibly receive some of the Holy Spirit as well?

Congratulations on your confirmation!

Regarding your baby, though, the Church would not teach that your confirmation would have any effect on him (or her). The sacraments are administered to particular persons, and your baby is a different person than you are, even though he’s snuggling (and punching and kicking) inside you right now.

Since your baby is (presumably) unbaptized (baptism in the womb being very rare, though possible), he wouldn’t be able to receive the sacrament of confirmation anyway, as baptism is the gateway to the other sacraments.

That being said, God might choose to bless your baby on the occasion of your confirmation, and you could always ask him to do so. Your baby will still need to be baptized and confirmed later on, though.

Also, why don’t we have any saints from the Old Testament (like St. Moses)?

The custom of putting "saint" in front of folks names started a long time ago when Christians would refer to the holiness of various individuals. Thus they would refer to "holy Mary," "holy John," or "holy Ignatius." So happens that the Latin word for "holy" is "sanctus," which also means "saint" (it can be either a noun or an adjective), so when these got translated into English, they would become "St. Mary," "St. John," and "St. Ignatius."

For some reason, this custom never really caught on when talking about Old Testament figures, presumably because the Christians who originated and fostered the custom were more focused on figures from the New Testament and more recen times than on the Old Testament. The Church does acknowledge certain Old Testament figures as being in heaven (e.g., Abraham, Moses, and Elijah), but the custom of calling them "St. Abraham," "St. Moses," and "St. Elijah" never really caught on. Just a quirk of the language.

Languages are funny that way.

A reader writes:

Quick question.  I am a recent convert from Evangelical Protestantism (4 years) and my 17 year old son is the first in the family to decide to follow me across the Tiber.  However, he is still attending an Evangelical High School and is getting quite a bit of propaganda from one particular teacher.  I am confident Stephen can hold his own but he got hit with something I had not seen before and thought you could help.  He was confronted with the following:

"You are clearly mistaken when you claim that the Catholic Church does not teach that Jesus is killed over and over again at every Mass.  The fact is, the Vatican II documents state on the bottom of page 102 that Jesus is immolated at the point of consecration.  The definition of Immolated according to the Webster Dictionary is, To kill as a sacrifice; To kill (oneself) by fire.  To destroy.  Sorry, there is no way around it."

This is a good example of why you can’t do theology by reading a standard, secular dictionary.

In theology certain words are used as terms of art, which means that they have a special, technical meaning that is not always reflected in popular usage.

The phenomenon is not limited to Catholics. A number of years ago I read a book (Chosen by God) in which the Presbyterian theologian R. C. Sproul complained that a secular dictionary (Webster’s, if I remember correctly) had a Lutheran-based definition of a particular term ("predestination" or "elect" or something like that).

Though not limited to Catholics, the problem does affect Catholics in a particular way since the use of terms among Catholic theologians is often determined by what it means in another language: especially Latin.

The writers of secular English dictionaries, not being Catholic theologians (or any theologians), are focused on words’ meanings in colloquial English and often are simply unaware of the technical meaning that the term has among theologians.

This is what is happening with immolation.

It comes from Latin. (Surprise!) It is based on in + mola. In is a preposition with a fairly wide range of meaning. It can mean in, on, at, into, and other things. Mola refers to ground grain (i.e., flour), particularly when mixed with salt.

In ancient times it was customary to sprinkle mola on a sacrifice, and this was referred to with the words in and mola, which became inmolatio, which became immolatio, which became immolation.

According to its word origins, immolation meant "to sprinkle with mola (flour mixed with salt)" according to the ancient custom. It then came to mean "to offer in sacrifice" and, since most (not all) sacrifices were killed, it came to mean "to kill," "to destroy."

Having said that, the Catholic Church does not teach that Jesus is killed anew in the Mass. His sufferings on the Cross have nothing added to them in th Mass.

There are two explanations for this that you will encounter in Catholic circles.

(First, though, let me complain about the fact that the person who put this objection to your son apparently cited a page number in a particular edition of the Vatican II documents–as if all editions shared the same pagination! What we really need to track this down is a document name, such as Sacrosacntum Concilium, with a section or "paragraph" number.)

First, some individuals have a kind of "time warp" theory, according to which the Mass warps the events of Calvary into the present. Jesus thus does not suffer and die again, but his suffering and dying in the first few decades of the first century is made present today.

A careful reading of Church documents, however, suggests that this is not what happens during Mass. For example, the Credo of the People of God (issued by Paul VI in 1968, just after Vatican II) states:

We believe that as the bread and wine consecrated by the Lord at the Last Supper were changed into His body and His blood which were to be offered for us on the cross, likewise the bread and wine consecrated by the priest are changed into the body and blood of Christ enthroned gloriously in heaven, and we believe that the mysterious presence of the Lord, under what continues to appear to our senses as before, is a true, real and substantial presence. . . .

The unique and indivisible existence of the Lord glorious in heaven is not multiplied, but is rendered present by the sacrament in the many places on earth where Mass is celebrated. And this existence [i.e., the glorious, heavenly existence] remains present, after the sacrifice, in the Blessed Sacrament which is, in the tabernacle, the living heart of each of our churches. And it is our very sweet duty to honor and adore in the blessed Host which our eyes see, the Incarnate Word whom they cannot see, and who, without leaving heaven, is made present before us.

This makes it sound as if the Eucharistic sacrifice involves the Christ of the present, enthroned in heaven and not (currently) suffering on the Cross. The sacrifice is the same in the sense that the priest is the same (Christ) and the offering is the same (Christ) and the purpose is the same (our salvation), but the mode of offering is different: As other Church documents stress, the Eucharist is an "unbloody" sacrifice (one in which his blood is not shed) but in which he (as high priest) offers himself to God for our benefit, in view of his work on the Cross.

Whichever way you go–the "time warp" theory or the "heavenly existence" theory–Jesus does not suffer and die again in the Mass. One makes present old sufferings. The other doesn’t involve suffering at all but an offering of himself as he is in the present. Both involve only death and suffering in the "once for all" sacrifice in the first century.

So sorry.

Christ doesn’t suffer or die a second (or further) time in the Mass.

Just doesn’t happen.

Fortunately, some contemporary English dictionaries acknowledge the history of the word immolation such that it doesn’t always require the deah of the offering. For example, Merriam-Webster’s says:

Main Entry: im·mo·late
Pronunciation: 'i-m&-"lAt
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): -lat·ed; -lat·ing
Etymology: Latin immolatus, past participle of immolare, from in- + mola spelt grits; from the custom of sprinkling victims with sacrificial meal; akin to Latin molere to grind — more at MEAL
1 : to offer in sacrifice; especially : to kill as a sacrificial victim
2 : to kill or destroy often by fire
– im·mo·la·tor /-"lA-t&r/ noun

The qualifier "especially : to kill as a sacrificial victim" indicates that the term does not always require the death of the offering. It can simply mean "to offer in sacrifice."

And thus Christ does not suffer or die anew in the Mass.

Them’s the facts.

Down yonder, a commenter (in dialogue with another commenter) writes:

The Church has traditionally distinguished between material apostasy and formal apostasy.

Jews who were never Christians are mateiral apostates. Jews who once were Christian are formal apostates.

"Based on that definition, any non-Christian of the Christian era could be considered a material apostate."

This is correct.

"Jews who sincerely believe that God requires them to follow the covenant established with Abraham and the Law given to Moses, and are therefore doing so to the best of their ability, can in no way be termed ‘apostates,’ materially or formally."

You obviously do not know the meaning of the phrase "material apostate" or "material sin" in general.

I’m sorry, but no.

The term "apostasy" is defined as follows:

[A]postasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith (Latin, apostasia, fidei christianae ex toto repudiatio) [CIC, Can. 751].

Regarding the material/formal distinction in moral theology, those who commit a sin "materially" are those who perform it through no fault of their own (i.e., without culpability), while those who commit it "formally" are those who perform it through their own fault (i.e., with culpability).

In regard to the sin of apostasy, a material apostate would be one who totally repudiates the Christian faith without being culpable for doing so (due to a defect of knowledge or intent), while a formal apostate would be one who totally repudiates the Christian faith with adequate knowledge and intent.

The problem with maintaining this in the case of Jews or other non-Christians in the present age is the meaning of the word repudiatio.

As you might suppose, repudiatio means "repudiation"–the rejection of something one has previously held.

One thus cannot be an apostate from Christianity unless one has previously been a Christian and then totally repudiated the Christian faith. Jews who have never been Christian and other never-been-Christians of the present age (or any age) are thus not apostates.

The correct term for never-been-Christian Jews and never-been-Christian others is "the incredulous" (i.e., those who do not believe), per the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

Incredulity [Latin, incredulitas] is the neglect of revealed truth or the willful refusal to assent to it [CCC 2089].

Those never-been-Christians who are disbelieve through no fault of their own are the materially incredulous. Those never-been-Christians who disbelieve through their own fault are the formally incredulous.

A reader writes:

My following question stems from an article on CNN.com about a futurist who is trying keep healthy so that he can live long enough for science to be able to provide immortality:

LINK SHORTENED BY JIMMY

Hah! As if! Sorry. Ain’t gonna happen.

I know you’re a sci-fi lover so I figured you may have though about how this might rest with the Faith. Would it be sinful to try to achieve immortality? I get the feeling that the answer is "yes" because God intends us to eventually join him in Heaven but I’m guessing there is a lot of grey area.

I would disagree, at least with the grounds stated. Dying is not a necessary precondition for joining God in heaven. St. Paul writes that at the last day, when Christ returns, those who are still alive will be transformed in the twinkling of an eye and be united with Jesus (at which point heaven and earth will become one, Revelation tells us). So if someone (in a state of grace) extended his own life indefinitely then he’d still be here when Jesus comes back and be untied with God.

One could argue that death is a punishment God means us to have and that it would be wrong to throw off the yoke of this punishment, but God doesn’t seem to mind us working to undo other effects of the Fall (e.g., striving against our fallen natures by his grace), so I don’t think that one could prove that it would be wrong to indefinitely extend one’s life by those means. We already know it’s kosher for physicians to help us extend our lives (Sirach is explicit on this point). At that point, it’s hard to see how any "you must not let your life go beyond this point or it’s a sin" command could be derived from the deposit of faith or natural law.

For instance, the nanites, stem cells (non-embryonic, of course), and other medical treatments could be used just to fight disease and not repair cell aging. In this way, you might live 2 or 3 times as long as you normally would. Would it be wrong if you used the technology to keep you alive for an extra 10, 50 or even 100 years and then stop using it? Would that be immoral? If not, how do you draw the line?

From what I can see, it would not be immoral. It also would not be immortal. "Immortal" means "exempt from death" (lit., "not mortal," with "mortal" meaning "subject to death"). If all you’re doing is upping the human lifespan, but not exempting a person from ultimate death, it ain’t immortality, just a longer mortality.

I don’t know if this makes a difference but this "immortality", would only protect against natural death.

Yeah, like Lorien on B5, who wouldn’t die on his own but could die from illness or accident.

No matter how many nanites you have pumping through your body, if you fall into an incinerator you’ll die.

Yes, though you might survive if you fall into a lava pit during a light saber battle. You might then need life-sustaining technology. In fact, you might end up more machine than man.

I hope this isn’t too frivolous a question; I’m sure you have a many more pragmatic questions thrown at you every day. I just find the topic of technology and morality interesting in this day and age.

Not too frivolous at all! As I often say, "There are no bad questions, only bad answers."

That being said, I’m quite dubious about this guy’s plan to live on indefinitely. There are a number of problems with it:

1. There is a very good chance that humans have a "death gene" that causes us to die. Evidence for this is found in the fact that, while the medicine of the 20th century has somewhat (not as much as people think) increased the average human lifespan, it hasn’t done anything to change the maximum human lifespan. Something seems to be impeding that, and that thing may be a gene. When you get to a certain age, the death gene reaches out its tiny microscopic hands to your brain’s lifeular lobe and does a Vulcan death grip on it, and that’s it. If we can find and turn off the death gene then we may get significantly more life out of life, but it still won’t go on forever, because . . .
2. Even if there is no death gene, the body will simply wear out over time (i.e., as soon as it gets out from under the service warranty you bought when you first acquired it), and I’d doubtful that combinations of nanites and stem cells could be applied in such a way to forestall this indefinitely.
3. Even if the body could be kept going indefinitely, the odds of getting into a fatal accident (e.g., on the freeway) or contracting an incurable, fatal illness go up as life gets longer. Eventually, something’s gonna get each of us.

There is absolutely no harm in trying to stave that off for as long as possible, though. After all, God built a survival instinct into us. So I say: Let’s go with our instincts! Bring on the (morally-developed) high tech!

Personally, I’m waiting for the Cellular Regeneration and Entertainment Chamber.

Oh yeah, and scientific immortality is one of those projects that has "Danger: May Cause Confusion of Tongues!" written on the box it comes in.

A reader writes:

My following question stems from an article on CNN.com about a futurist who is trying keep healthy so that he can live long enough for science to be able to provide immortality:

LINK SHORTENED BY JIMMY

Hah! As if! Sorry. Ain’t gonna happen.

I know you’re a sci-fi lover so I figured you may have though about how this might rest with the Faith. Would it be sinful to try to achieve immortality? I get the feeling that the answer is "yes" because God intends us to eventually join him in Heaven but I’m guessing there is a lot of grey area.

I would disagree, at least with the grounds stated. Dying is not a necessary precondition for joining God in heaven. St. Paul writes that at the last day, when Christ returns, those who are still alive will be transformed in the twinkling of an eye and be united with Jesus (at which point heaven and earth will become one, Revelation tells us). So if someone (in a state of grace) extended his own life indefinitely then he’d still be here when Jesus comes back and be untied with God.

One could argue that death is a punishment God means us to have and that it would be wrong to throw off the yoke of this punishment, but God doesn’t seem to mind us working to undo other effects of the Fall (e.g., striving against our fallen natures by his grace), so I don’t think that one could prove that it would be wrong to indefinitely extend one’s life by those means. We already know it’s kosher for physicians to help us extend our lives (Sirach is explicit on this point). At that point, it’s hard to see how any "you must not let your life go beyond this point or it’s a sin" command could be derived from the deposit of faith or natural law.

For instance, the nanites, stem cells (non-embryonic, of course), and other medical treatments could be used just to fight disease and not repair cell aging. In this way, you might live 2 or 3 times as long as you normally would. Would it be wrong if you used the technology to keep you alive for an extra 10, 50 or even 100 years and then stop using it? Would that be immoral? If not, how do you draw the line?

From what I can see, it would not be immoral. It also would not be immortal. "Immortal" means "exempt from death" (lit., "not mortal," with "mortal" meaning "subject to death"). If all you’re doing is upping the human lifespan, but not exempting a person from ultimate death, it ain’t immortality, just a longer mortality.

I don’t know if this makes a difference but this "immortality", would only protect against natural death.

Yeah, like Lorien on B5, who wouldn’t die on his own but could die from illness or accident.

No matter how many nanites you have pumping through your body, if you fall into an incinerator you’ll die.

Yes, though you might survive if you fall into a lava pit during a light saber battle. You might then need life-sustaining technology. In fact, you might end up more machine than man.

I hope this isn’t too frivolous a question; I’m sure you have a many more pragmatic questions thrown at you every day. I just find the topic of technology and morality interesting in this day and age.

Not too frivolous at all! As I often say, "There are no bad questions, only bad answers."

That being said, I’m quite dubious about this guy’s plan to live on indefinitely. There are a number of problems with it:

1. There is a very good chance that humans have a "death gene" that causes us to die. Evidence for this is found in the fact that, while the medicine of the 20th century has somewhat (not as much as people think) increased the average human lifespan, it hasn’t done anything to change the maximum human lifespan. Something seems to be impeding that, and that thing may be a gene. When you get to a certain age, the death gene reaches out its tiny microscopic hands to your brain’s lifeular lobe and does a Vulcan death grip on it, and that’s it. If we can find and turn off the death gene then we may get significantly more life out of life, but it still won’t go on forever, because . . .
2. Even if there is no death gene, the body will simply wear out over time (i.e., as soon as it gets out from under the service warranty you bought when you first acquired it), and I’d doubtful that combinations of nanites and stem cells could be applied in such a way to forestall this indefinitely.
3. Even if the body could be kept going indefinitely, the odds of getting into a fatal accident (e.g., on the freeway) or contracting an incurable, fatal illness go up as life gets longer. Eventually, something’s gonna get each of us.

There is absolutely no harm in trying to stave that off for as long as possible, though. After all, God built a survival instinct into us. So I say: Let’s go with our instincts! Bring on the (morally-developed) high tech!

Personally, I’m waiting for the Cellular Regeneration and Entertainment Chamber.

Oh yeah, and scientific immortality is one of those projects that has "Danger: May Cause Confusion of Tongues!" written on the box it comes in.

I want to thank the reader who asked about the weight of the doctrinal statements found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church as he reminded me to post on something I’ve been meaning to post on for a while.

In his book Introduction to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Cardinal Ratzinger considers the question of the authority of the Catechism and writes:

This brings us to the question already mentioned before, regarding the authority of the Catechism. In order to find the answer, let us first consider a bit more closely its juridical character. We could express it in this way: analogously to the new Code of Canon Law, the Catechism is de facto a collegial work; canonically, it falls under the special jurisdiction of the Pope, inasmuch as it was authorized for the whole Christian world by the Holy Father in virtue of the supreme teaching authority invested in him. . . .

This does not mean that the catechism is a sort of super-dogma, as its opponents would like to insinuate in order to cast suspicion on its as a danger to the liberty of theology. What significance the Catechism really holds for the common exercise of teaching in the Church may be learned by reading the Apostolic Constitution Fidei depositum, with which the Pope promulgated it on October 11, 1992–exactly thirty years after the opening of the Second Vatican Council: "I acknowledge it [the Catechism] as a valid and legitimate tool in the service of ecclesiastical communion, as a sure norm for instruction in the faith."

The individual doctrine which the Catechism presents receive no other weight than that which they already possess. The weight of the Catechism itself lies in the whole. Since it transmits what the Church teaches, whoever rejects it as a whole separates himself beyond question from the faith and teaching of the Church [pp. 25-27. NOTE: The paragraph breaks above are mine. While the catechism may not be a super-dogma, Ratzinger said all this (and more) in a single super-paragraph].

Thus the Catechism presents the teaching of the Church without elevating the doctrinal status of those teachings beyond what they otherwise have. Consequently, one must look to other documents and to the tradition of the Church to establish the doctrinal weight of any particular point in the Catechism. Since the Catechism treats many things that not only have not been taught infallibly but which also have been proposed in the most tentative of fashions (esp. in the area of social teaching), there remains due liberty for theologians (and others) when they encounter something that has been proposed only tentatively.

This was what allowed Cardinal Ratzinger to say, in his 2004 memorandum, that "There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia."

GET THE BOOK

A reader writes:

Since becoming Catholic I’ve heard a lot about capital punishment, and whether or not it should be opposed. Lately, however, I’ve become uncertain about how this ought to actually be applied. Some say that tobe consistently pro-life one should work against the death penalty as well as against abortion. This has caused some confusion on my part.

Okay, first off, be extremely careful about this "consistenly pro-life" stuff. This is rhetoric that is commonly used to hijack (or neutralize) the issue of abortion by relating it to other issues of a different character:

• Anti-death penalty folks use this rhetoric to try to establish a moral equivalence between abortion and the death penalty and thus argue that if you’re anti-abortion, you need to be anti-death penalty on the grounds that there is a moral equivalence between them such that supporting either would be "inconsistently" pro-life.
• Pacifists use the rhetoric to try ot establish a moral equivalence between abortion and warfare and use the same argument described above.
• Supporters of certain welfare or social programs try to establish a moral equivalence between abortion and not supporting their favored welfare or social programs such that if you’re against abortion you must also support their welfare or social programs to be "consistent."
• Some who oppose abortion seek to neutralize it by establishing a moral equivalence betwen it and other issues such as those described above and saying, in effect, if it’s okay for you to be inconsistently pro-life by not being anti-death penalty, pacifist, or a supporter of more money for this social program, then it’s okay for me not to be anti-abortion.

I know that the "consistently pro-life" rhetoric is out there in Catholic circles, including some highly placed churchmen, but in my judgment it is more of a hindrance than a help in dealing with the problem of abortion. One of the ways it does so is by putting a whole slate of agenda items in front of pro-lifers and making the problem too big to solve. It would be better to solve abortion and then work on other issues.

Another way it is a hindrance is that it has a tendency to mis-educate the conscience of the individual by establishing a moral equivalence between abortion and the other issues such that the individual who absorbs this language thinks or has a tendency to think that the issues are morally the same. Some who use the language may make the needed distinctions between the relative moral status of the issues, but these technicalities are lost on the ordinary individual.

Thus last year many in the Catholic community were convulsed by the question of could they vote for a particular candidate who opposes abortion but also supports the death penalty. The answer is: Of course you can. There are several reasons for this, but a key one is the fact that abortion and capital punishment are not morally equivalent. Abortion is intrinsically evil (meaning always evil) whereas capital punishment is at most only extrinsically evil (meaning evil in some circumstances but morally licit in others).

The same thing goes for war, social programs, etc. They just aren’t of the same moral status, and in my opinion we will be better able to deal with these problems if we use a language that better conforms to the objective differences in the moral status of these subjects. A "one-size-fits-all" rhetoric like the "consistenly pro-life" stuff has a tendency to mis-educate the conscience of individuals and thus make the problems harder to deal with.

However, after looking at the Catechism and reading bits of earlier Church documents touching on the subject, it seems that the ideas of when and how the death penalty can and should be applied have modified dramatically over the centuries. As such, is the current teaching in the Catechism to be considered an infallible teaching of faith and morals, or is it of a lesser nature–say, a personal opinion of the Pope that need not be absolutely accepted by all laymen? (This would especially concern Catholic politicians since it seems that the Church allows for the state to make up its own mind on this matter.)

When the Pope says that capital punishment should be used "rarely if at all," is this an official magisterial statement, or a statement as a personal theologian? Can one be consistently pro-life while approving of capital punishment?

Despite a popular impression to the contrary, the Catechism is not an infallible document (hence it’s already been revised once to fix some minor issues that needed correction). It is a realiable guide to the teaching of the faith, and it does repeat a number of infallible teachings, but it does not, as a whole, enjoy the property of having been written under the charism of infallibility.

This is something that Cardinal Ratzinger is at some pains to point out in THIS BOOK. In fact, he points out that the inclusion of a particular item in the Catechism does not change its doctrinal status. It has only the level of authoritativeness that it had prior to its inclusion in the Catechism. Thus you have to look at its doctrinal status in other Church documents to determine what weight it has in the Catechism.

Ths means that you have to look at Evangelium Vitae 56 to determine the doctrinal weight of the statement on the death penalty, and when one does that it is clear that it is phrased in a very tentative way that may be best understood as the prudential judgment of the pope and not as a matter to which all Catholics are required to assent.

Thus in his memorandum of last summer, Cardinal Ratzinger noted:

Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia [SOURCE].