Quote:
Originally posted by Beryana
Once again, I am not a Canon Lawyer, but as Rob said, the Catholic Church has no authority to put ANYONE to death (its that whole Ten Commandment thing!). The Church CAN deny someone the Sacrements, Christian burial, etc (this is when excommunication is) but not pass a death sentence - and heresy, apostacy, schism, sacrilege, etc are sometimes not even the grounds for excommunication - well, schism is but sometimes not the others!
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I'm sorry Beryana but that is not what I said - what I said is the Church wouldn't
carry out death sentances - they'd judge, sentance, and hand over the condemned; just not actually do the killing themselves... kinda an interesting way to keep their theological hands clean of violating a Commandment huh?
It was all tied into the edicts from the Early Middle Ages prohibiting clergy from taking up arms or taking a life - basically in an effort to A) adhere to/reinforce the spiritual role of and theological teachings of the clergy; B) to firmly establish secular and clerical authorities and realms of power; C) PR issues, it's hard to preach peace and obedience to God when you have cases like Irish monastaries going to war against each other with monks killing/maiming monks just was bad press...