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Human beings ‘not allowed to kill’
- Published on Mar 18, 2017, 12:14 am AST
- By Gyasi Gonzales
Fr Carl Williams, interim rector of the Holy Trinity Cathedral, yesterday said the death penalty should be abolished, as the Commandments make it very clear human beings are not allowed to kill, but love and respect each other.
Williams was expressing his views on the Government’s plan to re-introduce the death penalty with the assistance of former attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, SC.
Williams said: “In 2008, the Anglican Church made it quite clear the death penalty really should be abolished, as God has given and created life and has created us in his image. So when you see another person, you see the face of God.”
He continued: “Hanging is not going to be deterrent, as we need to teach people to live in communities with each other because I believe in life to the fullest and we believe that the death penalty is not a deterrent; so find the guns, see where the guns are coming from, because we have to go back to living and being a family again.”
He added: “Try to help children from an earlier age, be each other keepers, strengthen those who are weak, build bridges to help our communities and when we doing that, there will be no need for a death penalty and it can be a thing of the past.
“So therefore nobody should kill a person unless it is self-defence. But what is happening is that men and women out there are indiscriminately taking one another’s life, so it is like some people now have become Gods themselves and taking the lives of other persons and that cannot be good.”
Williams said if the Government carries out the death penalty, it would be going against the Commandments.
He continued: “We are about reconciling because can we imagine if we did not reconcile at all? We have to learn to forgive each other as well because we are about life, pro-life, and the church has to live by what Jesus taught us and Jesus said we have to try to assist and help persons.”
Williams also weighed in the recent spate of violence against women, saying they “are the bearers of humanity. Without women there is no humanity and some men also need to change from their way of thinking and ask themselves: what am I doing?”
Taken from: http://www.trinidadexpress.com/20170318/news/human-beings-8216not-allowed-to-kill8217
Comments
5 responses to “Human beings ‘not allowed to kill’”
From: Sonia Noel
Sent: Thursday, April 13, 2017 6:21 PM
Subject: Fwd: The dilemma with capital punishment
Dear All
For some time now I have been uncomfortable with the concept of hanging by the State. Committing murder is a heinous act but it is difficult for me to see why the State should take one (or more) of its citizens and force them to kill another human being by hanging (or any other form of execution). It would cause me great stress to have to be such an executioner and I empathise with all of them.
I don’t have the answer but, as Bishop suggests. maybe the offender should be made to perform some kind of service for the benefit of the community and for the families of the victims, together with committing to a mandatory programme for rehabilitation..
The link below is an article in which one such executioner relates his experiences. Please read, discuss and share. There was an attempt to encourage online discussion on the Diocesan website but this did not go very far – I believe the online discussion can still be continued.
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26273051?SThisFB
Happy Easter!
Sonia
P.O. Box 9388
National Mail Centre
Piarco
On Thu, Apr 20, 2017 at 6:35 AM, Kyle Grant wrote:
Good morning,
More on the discussion of capital punishment.
Prayer vigil at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in United States ahead of executions:
http://www.anglicannews.org/news/2017/04/prayer-vigil-at-trinity-episcopal-cathedral-in-united-states-ahead-of-executions.aspx
From: Sonia Noel
Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2017 12:38 PM
To: Kyle Grant
Subject: Re: The dilemma with capital punishment
Hi Kyle
Thanks for this share.
Interesting – but the Church in Little Rock has taken no position in this matter. Just a passive bystander and facilitator of whatever…… The service does include members of the Coalition for Abolition of the Death Penalty but the Church has offered no guidance here. Pity.
Sonia
P.O. Box 9388
National Mail Centre
Piarco
Conversation thread taken from Anglicanism Reloaded Facebook Group:
March 25 at 1:35pm
Sonia M Noel Why do I need to log in to leave a comment?
March 25 at 1:35pm
Kyle Difference Maker Grant Our website requires you to log in for security reasons. This is to ensure that we control and prevent spam and profanity from being posted on our website.
March 26 at 10:32am
Robert Keith Ramjohn
Robert Keith Ramjohn In Numbers did God not command Moses to kill a man who was collecting firewood on the Sabbath?Numbers 15:32-36Living Bible (TLB)
32 One day while the people of Israel were in the wilderness, one of them was caught gathering wood on the Sabbath day. 33…See More
March 26 at 5:28am · Edited
Robert Keith Ramjohn
Robert Keith Ramjohn I think the commandment before Moses broke it read..”Thou shall not kill for you will be hanged” It was the second commandment with a promise.
March 26 at 5:12am · Edited
Robert Keith Ramjohn
Robert Keith Ramjohn If we remove the death penalty then the new sentence must be life imprisonment with six strokes of the cat o nine tail every month for the rest of your life or until the age of 70 with one meal every two days. Can you imagine the horrible death of suff…See More
Image may contain: 1 person, smiling
March 26 at 5:39am · Edited
Sonia M Noel
Sonia M Noel The Diocesan Board of Social Responsibility holds a Panel Discussion on Saturday April 1 at 4.30 pm at St Mary”s Church on Crime and Violence in relation to Prison Justice – The Role of the Church. I believe the Board will be hosting other fora throughout the Diocese. This might be another opportunity to air views on this important topic.
March 27 at 7:37am
Roxane Lee-Affonso Is this open to the general public?
March 28 at 3:15pm
Sonia M Noel
Sonia M Noel Yes. At least I think so. Fr Maxwell said the idea is to engage congregations and the community.
March 28 at 9:57pm
Sonia M Noel
Sonia M Noel I think Church needs to get involved if we are to reverse this ridiculous situation in which we find ourselves.
Click the following link for The Right Reverend Bishop Claude Berkley’s views on capital punishment: https://anglicantt.com/2017/04/3165/