Hello, my name is Father Gregory Pine, and I'm a Dominican friar of the province of St. Joseph, and this is Pines of the Quines.

In this episode, I'd like to talk about killing. Why?

Well, in the fifth command, what we read now shall not kill.

And yet, in the Church of Scriptures, Tradition, and Magisterial Teaching, we find various justifications or defenses for things which look a lot like killing.

So, for instance, self-defense, or capital punishment, or just war.

All of those seem to be killing, and yet the Church defends those practices.

How is that? Right? So, how are we going to just stand killing?

And what is the basis upon which these other things don't fall afoul of the commitment?

Let's go ahead and look at it. Here we go.

Okay, let's go ahead and start with the example of self-defense.

And then on the basis of that, we can make brief application to capital punishment and to just war.

So, here's the scene. Let's say that you are living in a city, and that you're coming home late.

Let's say it's like 10 p.m., but you live in a part of the city which is kind of off the beaten track, not a lot of foot traffic, not a lot of fellow inhabitants.

And let's say that you recently suffered a foot injury and had surgery, and you're in a walking boot, so you're doing your best to kind of hobble home.

And let's say that you recently went back to college to get a degree in anthropology, and that you were presenting on bronze age like war instruments or weapons.

So, you have your like diorama with scaled versions of, you know, spears and clubs.

Okay, there you go. Perfect.

Now, let's say that from across the street, you see somebody kind of coming at you, and then that person announces, I'm going to kill you.

And the person is wielding what looks to be a large sword or knife. It's unclear. It's dark.

And you say to that person, stop. Don't do that. You make your best effort to hobble away, but it happens that the assailant is very fast.

And in addition to being really fast is dead set on accomplishing his or her purpose.

All right, so you call out to anyone in the nearby vicinity, but ghost town USA, no dice.

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