But more importantly, and to the point, here is what Pope Benedict said on the precise issue being discussed:

“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.”

The mainstream media has not missed a story.

As for abortion, when you consider that the Church’s position is that life begins at conception, the thousands of women who die from unsafe abortions cannot be compared to the millions of lives ended from the practice itself.

To focus on a few issues that are entirely consistent with the mission and teachings of the Church deliberately overlooks the immense time and effort the Church has spent on social justice issues all over the world.

But then again most people only see what they look for.

Amp,
I don’t think it is fair to call the Pope a “moral coward” either. It is not the Pope’s job to “stand up to the [American] right-wing”. Both Benedict and JPII were vocal against the war in Iraq and against torture.

Watch out, all of you! We may, on other blogs, as we speak, be disrespecting a host of historical and mytho-historical figures.

Sup with the term “disrespect” in this context, anyway? We mustn’t diss the dead? Pulling the euthanasia plug is too much like refusing to “get offa [the affected person's] lawn?” It’s okay to abort fetuses as long as we do it with reverent faces?

Thousands–actually, millions– of people in the third world (and first world and probably second world if anyone knows what the heck that is) are dying of HIV related diseases. But not only does the Church not consider focusing on prevention of HIV important, it actively tries to prevent HIV control through sex ed and condom distribution. Not to mention the thousands of women it dooms to death from unsafe abortions and childbirth by preventing access to safe abortions. Which is why I have a hard time taking the Pope’s supposed dedication to life very seriously.

To a degree, yes, if you look at the proper church authorities. You won’t see a lot of death penalty agitation coming from Europe, for example, for the pretty good reason that they don’t have it there anymore (mostly). You also won’t see a lot of it in the developing world, for the also pretty good reason that when thousands are dying from dysentery, there are focuses more urgent than three guys on death row. Watch the American church, and you will see plenty of sustained activity on the topic.

That said, why should the level of agitation and effort be commensurate? The two questions (besides being somewhat unrelated topically) also have widely varying social impact. The death penalty, at bottom, is about a relative handful of people. Marriage affects nearly everyone.

Hee hee.

Kidding aside, you’re also pretty off base in your working assumptions regarding the pontiff. Benedict has been a vigorous and staunch opponent of the death penalty and torture for many years, regularly opining and arguing against both.

Well, if that’s the case, then good for Benedict! But I think that just goes to prove my first point (even as it disproves my second point): The press does a lousy job of reporting on cases in which the Pope disagrees with conservatives, even as it does a bang-up job of highlighting cases in which the Pope disagrees with liberals.

So, Robert: Do you think we’ll see as much passion and activism from the Church authorities — including denying communion to politicians who disagree with the Church’s “not negotiable” position — against the death penalty as we will see against gay marriage, in the coming years?

*That is, had their heart stop pumping, their breathing stop, and their brain function stop. All of which is sometimes reversible with the right equipment, but none of which is ever reversed naturally.

That said, I’m not sure why this is getting so much play in the press at all. There was nothing new in this proclamation, if anything the Church is becoming more stalwart in its long-held positions and that’s exactly what was expected with the election of Pope Benedict. There’s no surprise here and unless you’re a Catholic, really, no news.