“Punishment should fit the crime.” That’s one way of explaining retributive justice. We maintain penal institutions and local jails to satisfy our sense of justice for crimes against society. It’s retribution for crimes. “Don’t do the crime, if you can’t do the time,” describes this kind of justice.
Another perception of civil or punitive justice is Christian. ” You have heard it said (referring to Dt 19:2) “An eye for an eye and tooth for tooth,” but Jesus says “No, if someone slaps you in the face, I tell you turn the other cheek.”
Then there is that challenging saying of Jesus which describes the concept of distributive justice: Jesus says if you have two cloaks –share one with the person who does not have anything to wear. She/he is naked without your justice.
Retributive justice does not claim to help the sinner to set himself on the road of new life but when the victim appeals to the sinner to change and offers forgiveness, the offer of mercy clears the way for a new life. (see the Prodigal Son/ Merciful Father). God’s mercy allows conversion.
“The determination of mercy as the basic attribute of God has consequences for determining the relationship of mercy to God’s justice and omnipotence. If mercy is the fundamental attribute of God, then it cannot be understood as an instance of justice; on the contrary, divine justice must be understood from the perspective of divine mercy. Mercy, then, is the justice that is idiosyncratic to God.
(Cardinal Walter Kasper in his book Mercy, The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to Christian Life.
Quoted by George E. Dunn in Christian Century, vol. 133, No. 2 –JN 20, 2016, P. 6)