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Some years back, in my article “Three questions for Catholic opponents of capital punishment,” I argued that Pope Francis’s statements on the death penalty cannot plausibly be read in a way that would make assent to them binding on Catholics. This week, in an article at Where Peter Is, Tony Annett offers a reply. Let’s take a look.
Criticizing Catholic teaching?
Let me start out by saying that I appreciate Annett’s attempt seriously to respond to the article. In the years since it was published, I have found that its critics almost always simply dismiss its conclusion without addressing the arguments for that conclusion, or at best raise objections that obviously beg the question. Though I don’t think his own objections succeed, I give Annett credit for trying to do better than that. Many readers will be aware that Annett is a sparring partner of mine on Twitter, and that our exchanges are sometimes heated. So I also appreciate that he responds here in a civil manner.
Having said that, it is unfortunate that Annett misrepresents my position from the get go (even if, I am happy to allow, inadvertently). He characterizes my article as “criticizing Catholic teaching on the death penalty.” That is not correct. By “Catholic teaching” Annett presumably has in mind teaching that the Church requires the faithful to assent to. I do not criticize, and would not criticize, any such teaching. My article addresses the question whether Pope Francis’s thoroughgoing abolitionist position vis-à-vis the death penalty actually is in fact a teaching to which Catholics must assent, or is instead a prudential judgment which they must consider respectfully but are not bound to assent to. I argue that it is the latter, and that there is no other plausible way to read it when all the relevant evidence is considered.
Continued below.
edwardfeser.blogspot.com
Criticizing Catholic teaching?
Let me start out by saying that I appreciate Annett’s attempt seriously to respond to the article. In the years since it was published, I have found that its critics almost always simply dismiss its conclusion without addressing the arguments for that conclusion, or at best raise objections that obviously beg the question. Though I don’t think his own objections succeed, I give Annett credit for trying to do better than that. Many readers will be aware that Annett is a sparring partner of mine on Twitter, and that our exchanges are sometimes heated. So I also appreciate that he responds here in a civil manner.
Having said that, it is unfortunate that Annett misrepresents my position from the get go (even if, I am happy to allow, inadvertently). He characterizes my article as “criticizing Catholic teaching on the death penalty.” That is not correct. By “Catholic teaching” Annett presumably has in mind teaching that the Church requires the faithful to assent to. I do not criticize, and would not criticize, any such teaching. My article addresses the question whether Pope Francis’s thoroughgoing abolitionist position vis-à-vis the death penalty actually is in fact a teaching to which Catholics must assent, or is instead a prudential judgment which they must consider respectfully but are not bound to assent to. I argue that it is the latter, and that there is no other plausible way to read it when all the relevant evidence is considered.
Continued below.
The Catechism and Capital Punishment: A Reply to Annett
Some years back, in my article “Three questions for Catholic opponents of capital punishment,” I argued that Pope Francis’s statements on t...
edwardfeser.blogspot.com
