Cardinal condemns Saddam‘s sentence
2006/12
ROME - A top Vatican official condemned the death sentence against Saddam Hussein in a newspaper interview published Thursday, acknowledging the crimes of the ousted Iraqi leader but reiterating that capital punishment goes against the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.
Cardinal Renato Martino, Pope Benedict XVI ‘s top prelate for justice issues and a former Vatican envoy to the United Nations , said that Saddam‘s execution would punish "a crime with another crime" and expressed hope that the sentence would not be carried out.
"The death penalty is not a natural death. And no one can give death, not even the State," he said.
On Tuesday, Iraq ‘s highest court rejected Saddam‘s appeal against a conviction and death sentence for the killing of 148 people in Dujail, in northern Iraq, in 1982. The court said the former president should be hanged within 30 days.
http://www.leadingthecharge.com/ViewArticle.aspx?id=38018&source=2
I wouldn't expect a Catholic cardinal to be pro death penalty and I hope they do pray for his soul. He has 30 days to get right with God. That is more mercy than he gave his victims.
Yet another reason why I am a non-practicing Catholic.
Did this dusty old fart from the Vatican ever read the Bible? The Death Penalty is a just penalty for the most evil in society such as Saddam. - Live by the Sword die by the Sword, etc...
The latter disputes the former. You are either FOR justice, or against it. The sentence IS justice and he is against it.
Obviously things have changed since the epoch of the Crusades and then remember WWII , when the Vatican sold itself out to placate fascism. Nothing has changed much since then, now the Vatican placates Islamofascists. The learning curve for this institution is at present, just a bit too steep.
Like the U.S. Marines have said, Saddam should have been shot in the hole where he was found, and the money for his trial distributed to those against whom genocide had been committed. But now the facts of his genocide hopefully will come to light as the trial on the genocide of the Kurds continues , of those who perpetrated the gassing of thousands. This is the activity that the Vatican sanctions by its ideology on the death penalty. They appear weak to those who live by the law of Sharia, and execute human beings at the drop of a hat, among them women who are guilty of nothing more than saying hello to a man who her family does not like.
I hope every Iraqui POS who was complicit in the genocide of the Kurds swings publicly, and that the photos of them swinging in the dry Iraqi wind be freely circulated among every Muslim community on the face of this earth, and a complete memorial addition of the same photos be presented to the Pope as a coffee table book.