Of course you will say, How can you possibly compare the United States to all of those evil regimes! All of those governments you mention tortured out of hatred and racism and lust for power, and for the sheer sadistic joy of it. *They* didn't torture to save the lives of innocents, like *we* do.

Yes. That is exactly what they said, too.

Torture does not save the lives of innocents. It destroys the lives of innocents — both by subjecting people who do not have the information their torturers think they have (and are thus innocents) to excruciating pain and suffering, and by rejecting more effective, more reliable, and in the end less time-consuming methods of information-gathering that *could* save the lives of innocents.

There is no such thing as torture in a good cause because any cause that resorts to torture to advance itself is a bad cause, even if it started out as a good cause. Torture turns good and decent people into monsters. Torture is addictive and seductive and plays into one of human nature's least attractive features: a sick, perverse fascination with and attraction to tragedy, pain, suffering. Torture encourages and elicits sadism, no matter what more noble impulses it started out with.

I could write more (on this subject, I could always write more), but I'll stop here for now.

“However, I would argue — contra Mark Daniels — that Christ's own words here on the divided roles of Spiritual and Temporal power suggest that the “Christian” view of torture may be more complex than Mark suggests
(i.e. that torture in a good cause — saving the lives of innocents — in the service of “Caesar” is not a contradiction of Christianity).”

I suggest that the complexity you cite is merely willful, and it's the 'complexity' that allowed the Inquisition and witch burning. If one merely looks at the death of Jesus to see just what was Caesar's,and what was God's.

As Jesus hung from the cross, a Roman cross with a Roman indictment proclaiming the sentence, He asked for forgiveness for those who executed him. You may contend that this was just Jesus being the Christ, but don't forget he also rebuked Peter's defense in the garden. Those who live by the sword, die by it. The line is pretty clear where man's and god's realms were proscribed.

Time and again, it's when man's ego decides to “do god's work,” atrocities are condoned in the name of god. I suggest what you call 'complex' should in fact be called 'confused.' The irony of the christian religion has been its repeated attempts to govern a realm that is not theirs to rule.

Jesus made the destincion quite clear:
“Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom belonged to this world, my servants would fight to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But for now my kingdom is not from here.”" john 18, 36.

When Jesus returns, feel free to torture if he commands it, in the mean time, knock it off.

After all, did not Christ – in his own words – declare a Christian version of separation of Church and State:

“Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21)

Jesus was, of course, referencing an imperial Roman state which practised torture as a matter of course.

It may be argued that Jesus was ambiguous in not clearly defining — beyond the immediate question of taxation — what are “Caesar's” due, and what are “God's” due.

However, I would argue — contra Mark Daniels — that Christ's own words here on the divided roles of Spiritual and Temporal power suggest that the “Christian” view of torture may be more complex than he suggests (i.e. that torture in a good cause — saving the lives of innocents — is not a contradiction of Christianity).

What was Jesus to the Romans if not that, and wasn't he subjected to torture and the ultimate “stress position” in the process of carrying out the sentence of death? If the most basic lesson of his life and death isn't part of your moral core, then attending church each Sunday is an exercise in futility, or more likely, a shallow exercise in being seen.