Gay interest: Discussion v campaigning

[french frank]

ff, I think you are not correct in the assertion of your first sentence. Murder is murder, Catholics believe.

What is it? And would that coincide, in any particular case, with the legal definition of murder, or could Catholics have a different definition? Would they disagree with a legal ruling? If so, should they ever serve on a jury in a 'murder' case?

[Padraig]

ff and fe,

What are you asking me?

[french frank]

ff and fe,

What are you asking me?

Well, in this country, in any particular case whether something is murder or not murder is decided by judicial process which varies with the circumstances. A Catholic theologian, Dr Donald DeMarco, writes: ""Murder" is a legal term and involves a judgment about the disposition, knowledge, and intention of the alleged murderer."

I'm not sure where Catholic belief that 'murder is murder' arises from, or what it means.

[Padraig]

Well, in this country, in any particular case whether something is murder or not murder is decided by judicial process which varies with the circumstances. A Catholic theologian, Dr Donald DeMarco, writes: ""Murder" is a legal term and involves a judgment about the disposition, knowledge, and intention of the alleged murderer."

I'm not sure where Catholic belief that 'murder is murder' arises from, or what it means.

All I'm saying, ff, is that Catholics are taught to be true to their own selves. The commandment says Thou shalt not kill. Guilt is known to the killer, and also the motive, or, the disposition, knowledge and intention. If you are the killer, you know it. In a way, the legal system is only a poor substitute for discovering guilt - hence miscarriages of justice. As I said before, I'm a simple soul. I do believe in owning up.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

What are you asking me?

I was asking about your statement that the Church "would not feel that they had to account for killings ... "; frenchie had mentioned Savonarola whose killing was sanctioned/authorized by the Church, as was the case with Bruno, whom I mentioned. I wondered if you meant that the Church now feels that it had nothing to account for in these and similar cases (other than regret that they ever happened)?

[Pabmusic]

Well, in this country, in any particular case whether something is murder or not murder is decided by judicial process which varies with the circumstances. A Catholic theologian, Dr Donald DeMarco, writes: ""Murder" is a legal term and involves a judgment about the disposition, knowledge, and intention of the alleged murderer."

I'm not sure where Catholic belief that 'murder is murder' arises from, or what it means.

The term 'murder' is hardly a religious one. It's an English (well Norman-French) one for what English law defines as a criminal act. Almost all other jurisdictions have something similar but notably not identical. In the case of our law (which began as English/Welsh, but equally now applies to Scotland) the present definition was 'firmed up' (as they say) by Sir Edward Coke in the 18th century:

"Murder is when a man of sound memory and of the age of discretion, unlawfully killeth within any county of the realm any reasonable creature in rerum natura under the King's peace, with malice aforthought, either expressed by the party or implied by law, so as the party wounded, or hurt, etc. die of the wound or hurt, etc. within a year and a day of the same". (Though the 'year and a day' rule has since been changed by statute.)

My point is that the definition varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. The ones in use in the UK are not religion-based - nor, I suspect, are they in many jurisdictions - and certainly are not based on Catholicism.

The Bible, in which God is directly responsible for a few million deaths - often in obscene circumstances - hardly helps. The Sixth Commandment says לֹא תִּרְצָח (tsaktir lo) - which can indeed be translated as 'murder', but this brings the subtext of English law into the Torah, which is quaint at least. It refers to killings that are unacceptable, which doesn't help very much ("which killings are unacceptable?" - "the ones that are against the law"). The point here is that any translation of לֹא תִּרְצָח should take account of the social context of ancient desert tribespeople, and in any case merely states an idea common to almost all cultures (including more ancient ones - the Code of Hammerabi, for instance). There is even a good case to be made that "Thou shalt not kill" actually meant "don't kill your fellow Jews".

Individual sects (Catholics, for instance) will have differing views on the idea of murder, but they are just that - differing views.

[Padraig]

I was asking about your statement that the Church "would not feel that they had to account for killings ... "; frenchie had mentioned Savonarola whose killing was sanctioned/authorized by the Church, as was the case with Bruno, whom I mentioned. I wondered if you meant that the Church now feels that it had nothing to account for in these and similar cases (other than regret that they ever happened)?

ferney, the Church will have to answer for itself. I questioned the definition of murder offered by ff, and went on to say that if I killed someone - God forbid - I would know in my heart if it was murder or not. However I can't know what is in someone else's heart, which is why I espoused the notion of owning up. This is my belief, whatever the law says, and my beliefs come from my early upbringing which was in a Catholic household.
Now, put a case of killing into a courtroom and ask me a different question.

[french frank]

went on to say that if I killed someone - God forbid - I would know in my heart if it was murder or not.

François Mauriac was quoted as saying that he was not a Catholic novelist, but a novelist who was a Catholic. So I would say you would be pronouncing as, what? - a 'Catholic judge' or a judge who was a Catholic? It seems to me it would be the latter: not a judge of the judiciary, nor a 'Catholic judge', but a Catholic deciding within himself based on conscience and upbringing, rather than having learned a catechetical definition of murder. Some Catholics believe that abortion is murder, though Dr Noonan says (if I understand him correctly) that that is not a 'Catholic belief'.

[ahinton]

François Mauriac was quoted as saying that he was not a Catholic novelist, but a novelist who was a Catholic.

That sounds rather like Schönberg who declared rather understandably his desire to be remembered not as a twelve-tone composer but as a twelve-tone composer...

[french frank]

That sounds rather like Schönberg who declared rather understandably his desire to be remembered not as a twelve-tone composer but as a twelve-tone composer...

Or, grammatically, when Queen Victoria's mother was (allegedly) corrected when she said that on her daughter's accession she became Queen Mother: not the Queen Mother, but the Queen's mother. So a difference between a Catholic's belief and a Catholic belief.

[scottycelt]

Individual sects (Catholics, for instance) ... .

According to Wiki (which corresponds to other widely-understood definitions of 'sect') ...

A sect is a subgroup of a religious, political or philosophical belief system, usually an offshoot of a larger religious group. Although in past it was mostly used to refer to religious groups, it has since expanded and in modern culture can refer to any organization that breaks away from a larger one to follow a different set of rules and principles. The term is occasionally used in a malicious way to suggest the broken-off group follows a more negative path than the original. The historical usage of the term sect in Christendom has had pejorative connotations, referring to a group or movement withheretical beliefs or practices that deviate from those of groups considered orthodox.^[1]

I'd be interested in Pab revealing which mainstream group he considers the Catholic Church, probably the largest institution with the most widespread membership on Earth, to be a sub-group or off-shoot?

[french frank]

I'd be interested in Pab revealing which mainstream group he considers the Catholic Church, probably the largest institution with the most widespread membership on Earth, to be a sub-group or off-shoot?

I was just at my OED so:

" In modern use, commonly applied to a separately organized religious body, having its distinctive name and its own places of worship; a ‘denomination’. Also, in a narrower sense, one of the bodies separated from the Church. the sects n. applied by Anglicans to the various bodies of Dissenters, by Roman Catholics to all forms of Protestantism."

1836 T. Arnold in A. P. Stanley Life & Corr. T. Arnold (1845) II. 23 Almost all who profess to value Christianity seem when they are brought to the test to care only for their own sect.

[scottycelt]

I was just at my OED so:

" In modern use, commonly applied to a separately organized religious body, having its distinctive name and its own places of worship; a ‘denomination’. Also, in a narrower sense, one of the bodies separated from the Church. the sects n. applied by Anglicans to the various bodies of Dissenters, by Roman Catholics to all forms of Protestantism."

'Separately organised religious body' from what?

Judaism, maybe ... ?

[jean]

'Separately organised religious body' from what?

From other religious bodies, themselves separately organised.

[scottycelt]

From other religious bodies, themselves separately organised.

Ah, I see ... so even the original much larger 'religious body' is now to be also known as a 'sect' maybe to comply with 'equality' laws ... ? :smile: