[SMEDLEYBUTLER]

Doesn't Scalia's position (and JFK's) make them bad Catholics in the eyes of the Church?

Scalia's position is completely in line with Church teaching. Refer to Catechism of the Catholic Church #2267 and Evangelium vitae #56. Scalia's remarks are directed at those Catholic jurists who refuse to follow the law and impose the death penalty, even when it is justified. Thus they legislate from the bench, which is not their role.

[meandog]

Let's start a Christian/Roman debate because it is certainly germane to what the Bishop of Rome should/should not say. This is exactly how the Roman church lost its property, priests and pulpits in 16th Century England and why it is losing masses of communicants today. The Bishop of Rome has no business in the affairs of state-sanctioned judicial matters; he may lament it ecclesiastically from his altar, but to put his misgivings in an encyclical as a dictate to judges goes beyond the scope of papal authority!