capital punishment

rehabilitation = most important

AGREE

rehabilitation is concerned with changing the criminal for the better. St Paul taught ‘do not confirm the pattern of this world but BE TRANSFORMED BYRENEWING YOUR MIND’.

When rehabilitation is the aim of punishment offenders can receive counselling and drug rehabilitation. Through this they can become better people and live as god wants them to.

AGREE

• the one that follows the teachings of Jesus → looks beyond the crime committed and tries to understand the reasons the offender committed the crime.

• gospels confirm the importance of rehabilitation for Christians. Jesus often looked beyond the person’s sins for example the sinful woman, Zacchaeus and the woman caught in adultery.

• through his compassion for the sinner they were rehabilitated ‘go and do not sin again’.

DISAGREE

most important aim of punishment is retribution. fundamentalist Christians might argue that in the Old Testament God clearly states that justice must be done and that the punishment must be equal to the crime. An eye for and eye and a … life for a life’. This is the only way in which the victim of a crime gets true justice.

WA: God is not only just but also merciful. In the Old Testament we find many instances where the guilty were spared the sentences they deserved.

DISAGREE

deterrence as an aim of punishment. The sentence/ punishment given must be enough to deter the offender from reoffending or others from committing the same crime.

We must recognise that there is sin in the world and that sinners must be deterred from causing harm to others. The CCC states that the punishment must be just enough to deter others and must not be overly harsh on the

offender.