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"In general, it is not permitted to provoke the persecutor." Indeed, Hurtado's comment on "the famous canon of the Council of Elvira" (c. 306) is that "where Christians have been put to death for having destroyed the idols or temples of pagans, these latter should be presumed to have acted legitimately on the basis of the right to self-defence, and not out of a hatred of the faith [(par légitimate défense et non par haine de la foi)]."
R. Hedde, "Martyre," Dictionnaire de théologie catholique 10.1 (1928), col. 230, italics mine. The reference is to Thomas Hurtado (1589-1659), Resolutiones orthodoxo-morales, scholasticæ, historicæ de vero, unico et proprio martyrio fidei sanguine sanctorum violenter effuso rubricato . . . (Cologne, 1655). The canon referred to is no. 60:
If someone has broken idols and on that account was put to death, inasmuch as this is not written in the Gospel nor is it found ever to have been done in the time of the apostles, he shall not be included in the ranks of the martyrs.
Trans. Samuel Laeuchli: "Appendix: The canons," Power and sexuality: the emergence of canon law at the Synod of Elvira (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1972), 133, a better translation than http://faculty.cua.edu/pennington/Canon%20Law/ElviraCanons.htm. Latin is
Si quis idola fregerit, & ibidem fuerit occisus quatenus in evangelio scriptum non est, neque invenitur sub apostolis unquam factum, placuit in numero eum non recipi martyrum.
Mansi 2 (1759), col. 15, here: http://www.veritatis-societas.org/200_Mansi/1692-1769,_Mansi_JD,_Sacrorum_Conciliorum_Nova_Amplissima_Collectio_Vol_002,_LT.pdf. This differs slightly from http://www.conorpdowling.com/library/council-of-elvira, but the true critical edition is La coleccion canonica Hispana, ed. Martinez Diez & Rodriguez, vol. 4 (1984), pp. 233-268.
"Catholics must gladly acknowledge and esteem the truly christian endowments which derive from our common heritage and which are to be found among our separated brothers and sisters. It is right and salutary to recognize the riches of Christ and the virtuous deeds in the lives of others who bear witness to Christ, even at times to the shedding of their blood. For God is always wonderful and his works too deserve our wonder."
Unitatis redintegratio 1.4; Decrees, ed. Tanner, vol. 2, p. 912. Cf. "Indeed there is a true bond in the holy Spirit, since it is he who is also at work in these persons with his sanctifying power through gifts and graces, and he has strengthened some of them to the point of the shedding of their blood" (Lumen gentium 2.25; Decrees, ed. Tanner, vol. 2, p. 861). P.-Th. Camelot sees this as "progress . . . by relation to the theologians and the canonists who hesitated to give the title and the merit of martyr to heretics or schismatics" (Catholicisme: hier, aujourd'hui, demain, s.v. Martyr (vol. 8, col. 775)), referring to DTC 10, col. 233 (1928), where R. Hedde, speaking of the heretic who dies for [2] a point of doctrine held in common ("provided that he be habitually disposed to believe all that would be proposed to him by the legitimate authority"), invokes the "Benedictine" distinction between his status coram Deo and his status coram Ecclesia. Coram Deo he may well be a true martyr; coram Ecclesia (which has no access to the heart) he is not. Yet Hedde questions even this: once it is admitted that a heretic invincibiliter may be a martyr coram Deo, won't it be necessary to grant this same status to the heretic who dies "with the same sincerity in order to defend an erroneous assertion that he believes to belong to the Christian Credo" (in order, in other words, to defend [1] what, from the Catholic point of view, is heresy in fact)?
"A good act, while fully our own, is good only because it comes entirely from God, being the act of God before being ours. An evil act, on the other hand, is such to the extent in which our action is no longer fully the action of God."
Louis Bouyer, Woman and man with God: an essay on the place of the Virgin Mary in Christian theology and its significance for humanity, trans. Fr. A. V. Littledale (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1960 [1957]), 110.
"Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor's tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense."
"Scandal can be provoked by laws or institutions, by fashion or opinion.
"Therefore, they are guilty of scandal who establish laws or structures leading to the decline of morals and the corruption of religious practice, or to 'social conditions that, intentionally or not, make Christian conduct and obedience to the Commandments difficult and practially impossible.'"
Catechism of the Catholic Church ##2284, 2286 (http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism_lt/p3s2c2a5_lt.htm#II). The quote is from a discourse delivered by Pius XII on 1 June 1941.
Moreover,
"The citizen is obliged in conscience not to follow the directives of the civil authorities when they are contrary to the demands of the moral order, to the fundamental rights of persons or the teachings of the Gospel. Refusing obedience to civil authorities, when their demands are contrary to those of an upright conscience, finds its justification in the distinction between serving God and serving the political community. 'Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.' 'We must obey God rather than men'. . . ."
Catechism of the Catholic Church #2242 (http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism_lt/p3s2c2a4_lt.htm#V).
"Oratio condicio est pernecessaria ut quis praeceptis Dei oboedire possit."
Catechism of the Catholic Church #2098.
"Charity is the form of all the virtues. Under its influence, chastity appears as a school of the gift of self. Self-mastery is ordered to the gift of self."
"Caritas est omnium virtutum forma. Sub eius influxu, castitas tamquam schola apparet doni personae. Dominium sui ad sui ordinatur donum."
Catechism of the Catholic Church #2346.
Conversely, then, no chastity (theologally informed), no gift of self.
"PZ Myers, an outspoken atheist and associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota-Morris. . . . last year angered Catholics when he [1] publicly tried to desecrate consecrated communion wafers". Myers "has a blog and often speaks at SSA-affiliate group meetings, where he [2] urges students to go public about their unbelief and to foster a positive image."
RNS, as quoted in the Christian century 126, no. 21 (October 20, 2009): 18, italics mine. SSA stands for the Secular Student Alliance, and RNS, probably, for Religion News Service.
