Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A: Invitation

Reflection for the Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A  

October 11, 2026  

Isaiah 25:6-10a; Psalm 23; Philippians 4:12-14, 19-20; Matthew 22:1-14

On this Sunday the Church sets before us a vision of abundance and invitation. Isaiah speaks of the mountain of the Lord where God prepares a rich feast for all peoples, destroys the veil that covers the nations, and swallows up death forever, wiping every tear from every face. The psalm answers with the confidence of the one who is shepherded through the dark valley and finds a table prepared even in the presence of enemies. Paul, writing from his own experience of want and plenty, testifies that he has learned the secret of contentment because “I can do all things in him who strengthens me,” and that God will fully supply every need according to his riches in Christ. The Gospel then gathers these images into Jesus’ parable of the wedding feast: a king who prepares a banquet for his son and sends servants to summon the invited guests.

Many refuse the invitation—some out of indifference to their farms and businesses, others by violence against the messengers. The king fills the hall with those found on the roads, both good and bad. Yet when he enters, he finds one guest without a wedding garment and has him cast into the outer darkness. The parable ends with the sobering word: “Many are invited, but few are chosen.”

The readings celebrate God’s radical hospitality and the destruction of death, yet they also insist that the invitation must be answered. The wedding garment is not a matter of external dress but of a life clothed in the righteousness that comes from responding to grace—repentance, conversion, and the works of charity that show we have truly accepted the call. God does not force anyone to the table; the feast is ready, but the guests must come prepared.

In this light the Church’s teaching on the death penalty finds a clear echo. The Catechism, revised under Pope Francis and reaffirmed by the Church’s ongoing witness, states that “the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person.” This is not a rejection of justice or of the state’s duty to protect the common good. It is a recognition, rooted in the Gospel, that even after the gravest crimes the human person retains a dignity that is not extinguished, and that modern means of detention can safeguard society while still leaving open the possibility of repentance and redemption. Isaiah’s mountain feast is a place where death itself is destroyed, not multiplied. The Good Shepherd walks with us through the valley of the shadow of death precisely so that we need not fear evil, and so that even the guilty are not finally abandoned to darkness.

The parable’s stern conclusion does not license us to take life; it warns us that we ourselves must put on the garment of faith lived out in love, lest we find ourselves outside the banquet. Those who refuse the invitation, or who enter without conversion, exclude themselves. Our response, then, is not to demand the definitive exclusion of others through execution, but to work for a society in which justice is tempered by the mercy that God himself shows, and in which every person—victim and offender alike—is invited toward the life that death cannot swallow.

Today’s readings call us to rejoice in the feast that is already prepared, to trust the Shepherd who supplies our every need, and to clothe ourselves in the readiness of conversion. They also summon us to defend the dignity that makes the death penalty inadmissible, so that the invitation to the mountain of the Lord remains open for all, and so that the day when death is fully destroyed draws nearer through our own fidelity to the Gospel of life.

Why the Death Penalty Is No Longer Needed: A Biblical, Patristic, and Catholic Case for Mercy in the Modern Age

Why the Death Penalty Is No Longer Needed: A Biblical, Patristic, and Catholic Case for Mercy in the Modern Age

In an era of secure prisons, advanced forensic science, and a deepened understanding of human dignity, the death penalty has outlived any practical or moral justification for most crimes. Once defended as a necessary safeguard for society, capital punishment now functions more as a symbol of retribution than a tool of justice. Drawing on Scripture, the Church Fathers, and the evolving teaching of the Catholic Church, this essay argues that the death penalty is no longer needed. The only conceivable exception—one that remains rare, tightly constrained, and open to debate—concerns those who sexually abuse children, where the protection of the most vulnerable may still warrant extreme measures if no other safeguard exists. Even then, the Gospel’s call to mercy and the possibility of redemption press hard against its use.

 Old Testament Foundations and Their Limited Scope

Scripture does contain clear commands for capital punishment. Genesis 9:6 states, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.” This post-Flood ordinance establishes a principle of retributive justice rooted in the imago Dei. Murder destroys a bearer of God’s image and thus warrants the severest response. Exodus 21:12 declares, “Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death,” while Leviticus and Deuteronomy list numerous capital offenses: adultery, certain forms of incest, blasphemy, idolatry, and kidnapping. Numbers 35:30–34 requires the death of the intentional murderer to purify the land.

These texts served a specific purpose in ancient Israel. As a theocratic people under covenant, Israel’s law blended civil, moral, and cultic concerns. Capital sanctions maintained order in a small, vulnerable society without modern prisons, forensic methods, or prolonged detention. They also underscored the gravity of offenses against God and neighbor. The requirement of multiple witnesses (Deuteronomy 17:6; 19:15) and procedural safeguards limited abuse. Rabbinic tradition later made conviction extremely difficult, reflecting a preference for life.

Yet these laws were never presented as eternal, universal norms for all societies. They belonged to the Mosaic covenant, which Jesus declared fulfilled (Matthew 5:17). The New Testament nowhere reissues the full list of capital statutes. Romans 13:4 acknowledges that governing authorities “bear the sword” as God’s servants to punish evil, but this is a general recognition of state authority, not a mandate for Christians to demand or administer executions. Paul’s own appeal to Caesar (Acts 25:11) shows he accepted the state’s power without endorsing every application. In short, the Old Testament provides historical precedent and a principle of justice, not a permanent blueprint for modern penal systems.

 Jesus’ Teaching and the Priority of Mercy

Jesus transforms the landscape. In the Sermon on the Mount he addresses the lex talionis directly: “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:38–39). While this primarily governs personal retaliation rather than state justice, it reveals the kingdom ethic of non-violence and forbearance that should shape Christian priorities.

The clearest narrative is the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1–11). The scribes and Pharisees bring her for stoning under Mosaic law, seeking to trap Jesus. He replies, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” The accusers depart. Jesus then says, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” Interpreters debate the passage’s textual history and legal nuances—both parties should have been charged, and the Romans had restricted Jewish capital jurisdiction (John 18:31). Still, the story’s force is unmistakable: Jesus refuses to authorize execution and prioritizes mercy and conversion. Even the sinless one does not condemn her to death.

Elsewhere Jesus teaches love of enemies (Matthew 5:44), forgiveness (Matthew 6:14–15; 18:21–22), and the primacy of reconciliation. He himself accepts unjust capital punishment on the cross, praying, “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34). The early Christian community lived under the shadow of Roman executions yet emphasized mutual charity and readiness for martyrdom rather than demands for the sword against opponents. The New Covenant centers on the Cross, which overcomes sin through self-giving love rather than reciprocal bloodshed.

 The Church Fathers: Legitimacy in Principle, Restraint in Practice

The Fathers generally accepted the state’s right to execute criminals while urging extreme caution and mercy. Tertullian and Lactantius, writing before Constantine, were more pacifist and opposed Christian participation in bloodshed. Once the Church gained influence, the majority view shifted.

St. Augustine, in The City of God (Book I, chapter 21), affirms that public authority may put criminals to death “according to the law, that is, the will of the most just reason,” without violating “Thou shalt not kill.” The magistrate acts as God’s instrument. Yet Augustine repeatedly intervened against executions, especially of Donatists who had committed violence against Catholics. In letters to officials he begged them to “forget that you have the power of capital punishment” and spare lives so that sinners might repent. Executions, he argued, closed the door to conversion and risked staining the memory of victims. For Augustine, the state’s theoretical authority coexists with the Church’s pastoral duty to plead for clemency.

St. Thomas Aquinas, synthesizing Augustine and Aristotle, offers the classic scholastic defense. In the Summa Theologiae (II-II, q. 64, a. 2), he compares the criminal to a diseased limb: “If a man be dangerous and infectious to the community, on account of some sin, it is praiseworthy and healthful that he be killed in order to safeguard the common good.” The part exists for the whole. Yet Aquinas also stresses that the goal of punishment includes the correction of the offender where possible and that killing the innocent is always wrong. Later tradition, including Pius XII, reiterated that capital punishment is not intrinsically evil when necessary for the common good.

The Fathers therefore do not provide a blanket endorsement of routine executions. They recognized legitimacy in principle while modeling a preference for mercy, rehabilitation, and the avoidance of bloodshed whenever feasible.

 Catholic Teaching: From Extreme Necessity to Inadmissibility

Catholic doctrine has developed in continuity with this tradition. For centuries the Church held that legitimate authority could resort to the death penalty for grave crimes when it was the only effective means of protecting society. The 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church (original n. 2267), incorporating John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae (1995), stated that the traditional teaching “does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.” It added that such cases “are very rare, if not practically non-existent” given modern detention capabilities.

In 2018 Pope Francis approved a revision of Catechism 2267. The new text recalls that the death penalty was long considered an extreme means of safeguarding the common good. It then notes three developments: greater awareness that human dignity is not lost even after serious crimes; a new understanding of penal sanctions oriented toward rehabilitation and reintegration; and more effective detention systems that protect citizens without permanently excluding redemption. Consequently, “the Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that ‘the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,’ and she works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”

This is presented as a development of doctrine, not a rupture. It builds on John Paul II’s emphasis on the dignity of every person and the medicinal purpose of punishment. Subsequent statements, including those of Pope Leo XIV, have reaffirmed the same position. The Church continues to affirm the state’s duty to protect the innocent (Catechism 2265–2266) while insisting that bloodless means now suffice in virtually every circumstance.

 Practical Realities: Why Capital Punishment Is Unnecessary

Modern states possess tools unavailable to ancient Israel or medieval Europe. Supermax prisons, electronic monitoring, and lifelong incapacitation can neutralize even the most dangerous offenders without taking their lives. DNA evidence and improved investigation have reduced—though not eliminated—the risk of executing the innocent. Studies of deterrence remain contested; many criminologists find little evidence that the death penalty uniquely deters beyond the certainty of long imprisonment.

Capital punishment is also irreversible. Wrongful convictions, racial and economic disparities in application, and the trauma inflicted on families of both victims and the executed undermine confidence in the system. From a Christian perspective, it forecloses the possibility of repentance and conversion that the Church has always prized. As Augustine understood, time for repentance is a grace.

 The Sole Contested Exception: Those Who Abuse Children

Even under the strongest case for abolition, one category of crime continues to test the limits: the sexual abuse of children. These acts destroy innocence, inflict lifelong psychological and spiritual harm, and often involve patterns of predation that are difficult to interrupt. Children are uniquely vulnerable; they cannot consent, defend themselves, or fully comprehend the violation.

Some argue that when an offender has demonstrated an incorrigible pattern of abuse, when prior incarceration has failed, or when the risk of reoffense upon any release is extreme, the state may face a situation analogous to the “absolute necessity” once contemplated by John Paul II. Protecting future victims—especially the most defenseless—could theoretically justify the ultimate sanction if no other means guarantees safety. Proponents of this view note that the harm is not merely physical but a profound assault on the image of God in the least of these (Matthew 18:6; 25:40).

Yet even here the presumption against the death penalty remains strong. The same Catechism that once allowed extreme cases now calls capital punishment inadmissible in principle because it attacks inviolable dignity. Practical risks persist: the death penalty for non-homicide sexual offenses can discourage reporting (especially within families), incentivize offenders to kill victims to eliminate witnesses, and produce irreversible errors. Many child-protection advocates therefore prefer lifelong confinement, civil commitment, and robust treatment and monitoring regimes. Jesus’ words about millstones (Matthew 18:6) express the gravity of the offense without prescribing state execution.

If any modern use of the death penalty can be tolerated, it is only in the rarest, most carefully adjudicated cases of predatory child sexual abuse where the offender’s continued existence poses a clear, ongoing threat that detention cannot neutralize. Even then, it should be approached with the deepest reluctance, accompanied by prayer for conversion, and never celebrated as justice.

 Conclusion

The death penalty is no longer needed. Old Testament provisions addressed the conditions of ancient Israel and were fulfilled in Christ. Jesus’ teachings prioritize mercy, conversion, and non-retaliation. The Fathers affirmed the state’s authority while pleading for lives. Catholic teaching has developed toward the recognition that modern means of protection render executions inadmissible as an attack on human dignity. Only the protection of children from unrelenting predators presents a conceivable, narrow exception—and even that remains highly contested and practically fraught.

A society that has the means to secure its people without killing them should do so. The Gospel does not demand naivety about evil, but it does call believers to seek justice that leaves room for redemption. In the light of the Cross, bloodless means are not only sufficient; they are more consistent with the mercy that has been shown to us.

 References

- Catechism of the Catholic Church, revised n. 2267 (2018).  

- Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter to Bishops on the revision of Catechism 2267 (1 August 2018).  

- John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae (1995), especially n. 56.  

- Augustine, The City of God, Book I, ch. 21; Letters 100, 133, 134, 139 (on Donatists).  

- Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 64, aa. 2–3.  

- Genesis 9:6; Exodus 21:12; Deuteronomy 17:6; 19:15; Matthew 5:17, 38–39; 18:6; John 8:1–11; Romans 13:1–4; Luke 23:34.  

- Pius XII, addresses on penal law (summarized in later magisterial statements).  

- Pope Francis, Address to participants in the meeting organized by the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization (11 October 2017).  

- Contemporary analyses of deterrence, wrongful conviction, and child-protection policy (e.g., discussions surrounding Kennedy v. Louisiana, 2008, and subsequent legislative debates).

 

Pope Leo XIV, the Death Penalty, and the Bible: Why the Church’s Teaching Holds

Pope Leo XIV, the Death Penalty, and the Bible: Why the Church’s Teaching Holds

On World Day Against the Death Penalty, Pope Leo XIV posted on X (@Pontifex): “The death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person. The common good can be safeguarded and the requirements of justice can be met without recourse to capital punishment: effective systems of detention have been developed that protect citizens while at the same time do not completely deprive those who are guilty of the possibility of redemption. NoDeathPenalty.”

This restates the 2018 revision of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (paragraph 2267), approved under Pope Francis and grounded in the development of doctrine already underway in St. John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae. It has drawn sharp attacks: the Pope supposedly “doesn’t read the Bible,” the Church contradicts Scripture, past popes employed an executioner so the teaching is inconsistent, and the American-born pontiff is somehow a “Chicago Democrat” or under external political control. These claims do not withstand scrutiny.

 The Bible and Capital Punishment: Texts in Context

Scripture takes human life with the utmost seriousness. Genesis 9:6 states: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for God made man in his own image.” Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy prescribe death for certain crimes (murder, and in the Mosaic code also various other offenses). Romans 13:4 says the governing authority “does not bear the sword in vain” and is “the servant of God to execute his wrath on the wrongdoer.”

These passages are real. They are also not a timeless, universal criminal code binding every society in every age. Catholic (and broader Christian) interpretation has long distinguished between the moral law, the ceremonial law, and the civil/judicial law given to ancient Israel as a theocratic nation under the Mosaic covenant. The judicial penalties belonged to that specific historical and covenantal context. They reveal the gravity of certain sins and the value of life made in God’s image, but they were not perpetual mandates for every civil order after the New Covenant.

Genesis 9:6 occurs in the context of the post-Flood covenant and the affirmation of human dignity; many traditional readings saw it as authorizing punishment of murder, yet its primary thrust is the sacredness of human life as God’s image, not a detailed modern penal statute applicable everywhere. The Mosaic capital laws (for adultery, certain forms of idolatry, etc.) were tied to Israel’s unique status and the holiness of the land and people. God Himself did not always enforce them rigidly (David lived after adultery and murder). The New Testament does not re-enact them as a civil code for Christian societies. Jesus intervenes in the case of the woman caught in adultery (John 8). Paul instructs the Corinthians to expel an immoral man from the community rather than execute him (1 Corinthians 5). Romans 13 affirms the legitimate authority of the state to punish wrongdoing and protect the common good; it does not prescribe capital punishment as obligatory in every age or culture.

Scripture is read in the unity of the whole, in light of the Gospel, and within the Church’s living Tradition (see Dei Verbum 12). The Fifth Commandment (“You shall not kill”) primarily prohibits the intentional killing of the innocent. Legitimate public authority has historically been understood to have a limited role in the defense of society. That principle remains; its application changes with circumstances.

 Development of Doctrine, Not Contradiction

The Church’s teaching has developed without denying prior recognition that the state may, in principle, use proportionate force—including, in earlier eras, capital punishment—to protect the common good when no other means exist. St. John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae (1995) and the subsequent Catechism text restricted it severely: cases of absolute necessity for the defense of society are “very rare, if not practically nonexistent” given modern penal systems. The 2018 revision builds on this, stating that today, with heightened awareness of the dignity that even the guilty retain, a clearer understanding of the purpose of punishment, and effective detention, “the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person.” The Church works for its abolition worldwide.

Cardinal Ladaria’s accompanying letter from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith described this as “an authentic development of doctrine that is not in contradiction with the prior teachings of the Magisterium.” Earlier ages faced different practical realities for restraining dangerous offenders. The Gospel’s emphasis on the possibility of conversion and the inviolable dignity of the person (which is not forfeited by crime) receives fuller expression as conditions allow. This is continuity in the protection of life and the common good, not a rejection of Scripture or Tradition.

 The Historical Papal Executioner

Critics note that the Papal States had an official executioner. Giovanni Battista Bugatti (“Mastro Titta”), who served from 1796 to the 1860s, carried out roughly 514–516 executions, primarily for civil crimes such as murder and robbery under the temporal government of the Papal States. He worked under several popes (including Pius VI through Pius IX) and recorded the cases. His successor continued until the fall of the Papal States in 1870. Executions were public and part of the ordinary administration of justice in a sovereign state of that period.

This historical fact does not contradict the present teaching. Popes of earlier centuries exercised temporal political authority over the Papal States as well as spiritual authority. Like other rulers of the time, they applied the criminal law then in force, consistent with the long-standing recognition that legitimate authority could use capital punishment when judged necessary for the common good. Doctrine develops as circumstances and understanding develop; past practice under different conditions does not freeze the Church’s moral judgment for all time. The Vatican City State later abolished the death penalty (it was unused after the Lateran Treaty period). The Church’s current position reflects the same concern for life and order expressed through the means now available.

 Political Conspiracy Claims

Claims that Pope Leo XIV (formerly Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost) is a “Chicago Democrat” controlled by Barack Obama or similar forces are baseless ad hominems. He is a Chicago-area native (raised in the South Side/Dolton area) and a White Sox fan. Illinois does not have formal party registration; records show he voted in several Republican primaries in the 2010s and as an undeclared voter more recently. He has long opposed the death penalty, including a 2011 note thanking Illinois Governor Pat Quinn for abolishing it in the state, consistent with his formation and the developing Catholic teaching of the time. There is no credible evidence of political control by any former U.S. president or partisan machine. His statements follow the magisterial teaching of the Church, not electoral politics.

 Why the Church Is Right

The Church is right because it reads the whole of Scripture and Tradition in the light of the Gospel. Human dignity, rooted in the image of God, is not erased by sin. Modern states can protect the innocent and the common good through secure detention that still leaves open the possibility of repentance and redemption—precisely the goods the Catechism highlights. Capital punishment ends that possibility definitively. The biblical emphasis on the sanctity of life and the state’s duty to restrain evil is upheld; the specific Mosaic penalties and the practices of earlier historical periods are not treated as eternal positive law for every society. Accusations that the Pope ignores the Bible usually rest on selective quotation and a failure to apply ordinary principles of biblical interpretation that Christians have used for centuries.

The teaching invites Catholics and others to work for justice that protects life on both sides of the equation: the lives of the innocent and the residual dignity and hope of the guilty. That is not liberalism or biblical illiteracy. It is fidelity to the Gospel in the circumstances of our time.

The Botched Execution of Christa Gail Pike

On the evening of September 30, 2026, Tennessee attempted to carry out the first execution of a woman in the state in more than two centuries. Christa Gail Pike, then fifty years old, was strapped to a gurney at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution after an eleventh-hour stay was lifted by the U.S. Supreme Court. What followed was not a swift lethal injection but a prolonged failure: repeated needle sticks, at least two doses of pentobarbital, audible snoring and complaints of pain, and, finally, an ambulance rather than a hearse. She was taken to a Nashville hospital in critical condition, later reported unconscious and on a ventilator while staff worked to clear the execution drug from her system. The governor ordered a review and halted remaining executions for the year.

The episode has produced the usual arguments about protocols, secrecy, and competence. It has also revived older, darker speculation tied to the crime itself. From a Catholic vantage, the facts of the case, the suffering of the condemned, the dignity that remains even after grave evil, and the Church’s developed teaching on capital punishment all demand a clearer accounting than either sensational rumor or procedural apology can supply.

Christa Pike was born on March 10, 1976. In late 1994 she was enrolled at a Job Corps center in Knoxville. She began a relationship with Tadaryl Shipp, then seventeen. Contemporary accounts and later reporting describe the pair as having developed an interest in the occult. On January 12, 1995, Pike, Shipp, and another classmate, Shadolla Peterson, signed out of the dormitory with nineteen-year-old Colleen Slemmer. Slemmer was told the outing was a chance to settle tensions—Pike believed Slemmer was trying to take Shipp from her—and that marijuana would be involved. In a secluded area near an abandoned steam plant, the pretense ended. For roughly half an hour Slemmer was beaten and cut. A pentagram was carved into her chest while she was still alive; Shipp later admitted he was the one who carved it. Pike used a box cutter and a meat cleaver. The attack ended when Pike struck Slemmer in the head with a large piece of asphalt, causing fatal brain injury. A fragment of the victim’s skull was later found in Pike’s possession; she had shown it to others. The three were arrested within about thirty-six hours. Pike was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in 1996. She was eighteen at the time of the killing and became one of the youngest women ever placed on death row in the United States. Years later she received an additional sentence connected to an assault on another inmate. She remained on death row for three decades.

The brutality of the crime is not in serious dispute. Slemmer begged for her life. The carving of a pentagram, the retention of a skull fragment, and the reported occult interest of the perpetrators fed the “satanic panic” atmosphere of the mid-1990s and have never fully left the public memory of the case. Pike’s own later statements, offered in clemency materials, described an eighteen-year-old who lost control and claimed untreated mental illness. Courts nonetheless found the evidence of premeditation and extreme cruelty sufficient for a death sentence. Shipp, a juvenile at the time, received a life sentence. Peterson’s role was more limited.

On the day of the scheduled execution, difficulty establishing intravenous access had already been predicted by Pike’s lawyers, who cited small veins and a blood condition. Witnesses and counsel later described an hour of attempts, at least seven needles in one arm, one of them bent on removal, discoloration, and burning at injection sites. Once the drugs were administered, Pike remained alive. She was heard complaining that her arm felt as if it were about to burst. She continued to make snoring sounds for a prolonged period. A second dose did not produce death. She left the prison in an ambulance. Attorneys stated she arrived with swollen, burned, and blistered arms and that hospital staff were attempting to save her life and remove the pentobarbital. One account indicated the drug may have entered tissue rather than the bloodstream because lines were improperly placed. Tennessee officials maintained that protocol had been followed. The commissioner of correction later announced his resignation amid the scrutiny. Whatever the precise mechanical failure, the result was that a person the state had resolved to kill was instead placed under intensive medical care.

In the days after the failure, various explanations circulated outside official channels. Some pointed to the occult elements of the 1995 crime and suggested demonic influence or possession: that a person marked by satanic symbolism could not be killed by ordinary means, or that dark forces had intervened. Others claimed the injection had been deliberately mishandled so as to maximize pain. Still others offered a providential reading—that God had permitted the additional suffering as a temporal penalty fitted to the cruelty of the original act. These claims should be distinguished carefully.

Catholic teaching recognizes the reality of demonic influence. The rite of exorcism, the warnings of Scripture, and the ordinary experience of spiritual warfare are part of the Church’s inheritance. Interest in the occult is not spiritually neutral; practices that invoke or imitate demonic symbolism open a person to real danger. The carving of a pentagram and the reported fascination with satanism in Pike’s circle are therefore not irrelevant to a Christian reading of the crime. They are evidence of a moral and spiritual disorder that accompanied, and may have intensified, the jealousy and rage that produced the murder. At the same time, the Church does not treat survival of a medical procedure as diagnostic of possession. Botched lethal injections have occurred before, for documented reasons of vein access, drug quality, and protocol design. Attributing this particular failure to a demon, rather than to the well-predicted difficulties of intravenous execution, exceeds what the evidence shows and risks turning a grave moral question into spectacle. Shipp, not Pike, is the person publicly identified as having kept a satanic altar and as having carved the symbol. Motive evidence at trial centered on jealousy. Occult interest can corrupt; it does not automatically explain every subsequent physical event.

The claim of intentional sabotage is similarly unproven. Lawyers for Pike had warned for months that her veins and medical condition made a botched procedure likely. Prolonged needle attempts and tissue infiltration are consistent with incompetence or with a protocol that conceals its own risks, not necessarily with a conspiracy to torture. Cruelty can result from negligence and secrecy as surely as from design. The state’s duty, if it claims the power to execute, is to avoid both.

The theological suggestion that God specifically ordained the extra suffering as punishment requires equal caution. Divine providence governs all events, and Scripture contains examples in which temporal consequences follow sin. The Church also teaches that suffering can be reparative when accepted in union with Christ, and that the guilty may still convert. It does not, however, license observers to declare that a particular failed execution is God’s chosen instrument of retribution. Judgment belongs to God. Speculating in that register often serves to dull sympathy for the person now in the hospital bed and to avoid the harder question the state has created for itself.

That question is the absurdity, from the standpoint of human dignity, of rushing a woman to the hospital so that physicians may save the life the execution team has just tried to end, with the standing intention of returning her to the same chamber once she is stable. The state asserts both the right to kill her and the duty to keep her alive long enough to try again. Medical professionals bound by an ethic of healing are conscripted into the interval between attempts. The condemned, already subjected to an hour of failed venous access and the effects of a large dose of pentobarbital, is stabilized so that the original sentence may be reimposed. Whatever one’s view of capital punishment in principle, the sequence exposes a contradiction. If her life is worth the resources of an intensive-care unit today, the claim that it may be deliberately extinguished tomorrow rests on a thin and unstable distinction between “punishment” and “care.” Witnesses described moaning, a body lifting, and prolonged snoring; attorneys described chemical exposure that left arms burned. The punishment, in other words, has already been carried out in a form the protocol never contemplated, yet the legal sentence remains unsatisfied until death occurs on the state’s schedule.

Catholic teaching addresses this territory directly, and it has developed. For centuries the Church held that legitimate public authority could, after a fair trial, employ the death penalty as an extreme means of protecting the common good when no other means sufficed. The Catechism promulgated under St. John Paul II still reflected that tradition while sharply restricting it: if non-lethal means are sufficient to defend lives, authority should limit itself to those means, “as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity with the dignity of the human person.” Evangelium Vitae (1995) judged that such cases had become “very rare, if not practically non-existent” because of improvements in penal systems.

In 2018 Pope Francis approved a revision of paragraph 2267. The current text recalls that recourse to the death penalty “was long considered an appropriate response to the gravity of certain crimes and an acceptable, albeit extreme, means of safeguarding the common good.” It then states the developed judgment: “Today, however, there is an increasing awareness that the dignity of the person is not lost even after the commission of very serious crimes. In addition, a new understanding has emerged of the significance of penal sanctions imposed by the state. Lastly, more effective systems of detention have been developed, which ensure the due protection of citizens but, at the same time, do not definitively deprive the guilty of the possibility of redemption. Consequently, the Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that ‘the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,’ and she works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s accompanying letter presented the change as a development in continuity, not a reversal of the state’s duty to protect the innocent. Modern detention, the letter argued, can achieve that protection without definitively closing the possibility of conversion. The death penalty, regardless of method, was described as entailing cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment and as vulnerable to error and selectivity. Subsequent popes have repeated the call for abolition.

This teaching does not erase the gravity of Pike’s crime or the lasting wound inflicted on Colleen Slemmer’s family. Dignity is not a sentiment that pretends the guilty are innocent. It is the claim that the image of God is not forfeited by sin, and that the deliberate killing of a person already securely confined adds a new injury rather than restoring the order that was broken. The three decades Pike has already spent on death row, the additional sentence for later violence, and the practical capacity of a maximum-security prison to prevent further harm are precisely the conditions the developed teaching treats as sufficient. The botched procedure supplies a concrete illustration of the “cruel, inhuman, and degrading” character the 2018 letter named: not as an abstract slogan, but as an hour of needles, a drug that did not kill, visible burning, and a transfer to intensive care.

Some Catholics continue to regard the older formulation as the more stable expression of doctrine and view the 2018 revision as a prudential judgment rather than an irreformable teaching. That debate is real and should not be papered over. Even on the older view, however, the death penalty was never a requirement; it was a permission conditioned on necessity. Where secure incarceration exists, the necessity disappears. The further step of hospitalizing a prisoner in order to preserve her for a second attempt finds no support in either formulation. It treats the human body as a technical problem to be solved twice—once by medicine, once by the execution team—rather than as the bearer of an inviolable dignity.

The occult rumors, whatever their partial root in the facts of 1995, do not alter the analysis. A person who has trafficked in satanic symbolism remains a person. The Church’s response to such disorder is repentance, sacramental life where possible, and, in rare and carefully discerned cases, exorcism—not the conclusion that ordinary moral limits on killing have been suspended. Nor does the possibility of divine permission for suffering authorize the state to multiply that suffering through incompetence and then resume the attempt. Mercy and justice are not opposed in Catholic thought. Justice acknowledges the crime and protects the innocent; mercy refuses to treat the offender as disposable. Both are violated when the apparatus of death fails and the apparatus of healing is borrowed only long enough to reset the clock.

What happens next remains, at this writing, unresolved. Pike is under medical care. Her lawyers have sought commutation, arguing that she has already endured a degree of punishment without parallel in the modern history of American executions. The state has paused other executions pending review. A Catholic assessment does not require certainty about every intravenous detail or about the state of Pike’s soul. It requires clarity about what the Church now teaches: that the dignity of the person survives even the worst crimes, that the death penalty is inadmissible as an attack on that dignity, and that the strange interval in which doctors labor to save a life the law still means to take is not a procedural footnote but a revelation of the practice’s incoherence. Colleen Slemmer’s murder was an act of intimate cruelty. The attempt to answer it by a lethal injection that became an ordeal, a hospitalization, and a plan to try again does not restore what was taken. It adds another chapter in which the state’s power over life and death is exercised, fails, and is reasserted without ever escaping the moral limit the Gospel places on the deliberate killing of the guilty.

Pope Amends Catechism on Death Penalty

The Vatican has announced the Pope Francis amended the Catechism of the Catholic Church regarding the death penalty.  The paragraph that will be amended will be paragraph 2267 which reads:

2267 Assuming that the guilty party's identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.
If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people's safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.
Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity "are very rare, if not practically nonexistent."68

- www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s2c2a5.htm

The new paragraph will read:

The death penalty
2267. Recourse to the death penalty on the part of legitimate authority, following a fair trial, was long considered an appropriate response to the gravity of certain crimes and an acceptable, albeit extreme, means of safeguarding the common good.
Today, however, there is an increasing awareness that the dignity of the person is not lost even after the commission of very serious crimes. In addition, a new understanding has emerged of the significance of penal sanctions imposed by the state. Lastly, more effective systems of detention have been developed, which ensure the due protection of citizens but, at the same time, do not definitively deprive the guilty of the possibility of redemption.
Consequently, the Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that “the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person”,[1] and she works with determination for its abolition worldwide.
__________________________
[1] FRANCIS, Address to Participants in the Meeting organized by the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, 11 October 2017: L’Osservatore Romano, 13 October 2017, 5.

- http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2018/08/02/180802a.html

A letter was sent to all bishops regarding this amendment. It reads:

Letter to the Bishops regarding the new revision of number 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church on the death penalty, from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 02.08.2018
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
Letter to the Bishops
regarding the new revision of number 2267
of the Catechism of the Catholic Church
on the death penalty
1. The Holy Father Pope Francis, in his Discourse on the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the publication of the Apostolic Constitution Fidei depositum, by which John Paul II promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church, asked that the teaching on the death penalty be reformulated so as to better reflect the development of the doctrine on this point that has taken place in recent times.[1] This development centers principally on the clearer awareness of the Church for the respect due to every human life. Along this line, John Paul II affirmed: “Not even a murderer loses his personal dignity, and God himself pledges to guarantee this.”[2]
2. It is in the same light that one should understand the attitude towards the death penalty that is expressed ever more widely in the teaching of pastors and in the sensibility of the people of God. If, in fact, the political and social situation of the past made the death penalty an acceptable means for the protection of the common good, today the increasing understanding that the dignity of a person is not lost even after committing the most serious crimes, the deepened understanding of the significance of penal sanctions applied by the State, and the development of more efficacious detention systems that guarantee the due protection of citizens have given rise to a new awareness that recognizes the inadmissibility of the death penalty and, therefore, calling for its abolition.
3. In this development, the teaching of the Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitæ of John Paul II is of great importance. The Holy Father enumerated among the signs of hope for a new culture of life “a growing public opposition to the death penalty, even when such a penalty is seen as a kind of ‘legitimate defense’ on the part of society. Modern society in fact has the means of effectively suppressing crime by rendering criminals harmless without definitively denying them the chance to reform.”[3] The teaching of Evangelium vitæ was then included in the editio typica of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In it, the death penalty is not presented as a proportionate penalty for the gravity of the crime, but it can be justified if it is “the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor,” even if in reality “cases of absolute necessity for suppression of the offender today are very rare, if not practically non-existent” (n. 2267).
4. John Paul II also intervened on other occasions against the death penalty, appealing both to respect for the dignity of the person as well as to the means that today’s society possesses to defend itself from criminals. Thus, in the Christmas Message of 1998, he wished “the world the consensus concerning the need for urgent and adequate measures … to end the death penalty.”[4] The following month in the United States, he repeated, “A sign of hope is the increasing recognition that the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil. Modern society has the means of protecting itself, without definitively denying criminals the chance to reform. I renew the appeal I made most recently at Christmas for a consensus to end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.”[5]
5. The motivation to be committed to the abolition of the death penalty was continued with the subsequent Pontiffs. Benedict XVI recalled “the attention of society’s leaders to the need to make every effort to eliminate the death penalty.”[6] He later wished a group of the faithful that “your deliberations will encourage the political and legislative initiatives being promoted in a growing number of countries to eliminate the death penalty and to continue the substantive progress made in conforming penal law both to the human dignity of prisoners and the effective maintenance of public order.”[7]
6. In this same prospective, Pope Francis has reaffirmed that “today capital punishment is unacceptable, however serious the condemned’s crime may have been.”[8] The death penalty, regardless of the means of execution, “entails cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment.”[9] Furthermore, it is to be rejected “due to the defective selectivity of the criminal justice system and in the face of the possibility of judicial error.”[10] It is in this light that Pope Francis has asked for a revision of the formulation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church on the death penalty in a manner that affirms that “no matter how serious the crime that has been committed, the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and the dignity of the person.”[11]
7. The new revision of number 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, approved by Pope Francis, situates itself in continuity with the preceding Magisterium while bringing forth a coherent development of Catholic doctrine.[12] The new text, following the footsteps of the teaching of John Paul II in Evangelium vitæ, affirms that ending the life of a criminal as punishment for a crime is inadmissible because it attacks the dignity of the person, a dignity that is not lost even after having committed the most serious crimes. This conclusion is reached taking into account the new understanding of penal sanctions applied by the modern State, which should be oriented above all to the rehabilitation and social reintegration of the criminal. Finally, given that modern society possesses more efficient detention systems, the death penalty becomes unnecessary as protection for the life of innocent people. Certainly, it remains the duty of public authorities to defend the life of citizens, as has always been taught by the Magisterium and is confirmed by the Catechism of the Catholic Church in numbers 2265 and 2266.
8. All of this shows that the new formulation of number 2267 of the Catechism expresses an authentic development of doctrine that is not in contradiction with the prior teachings of the Magisterium. These teachings, in fact, can be explained in the light of the primary responsibility of the public authority to protect the common good in a social context in which the penal sanctions were understood differently, and had developed in an environment in which it was more difficult to guarantee that the criminal could not repeat his crime.
9. The new revision affirms that the understanding of the inadmissibility of the death penalty grew “in the light of the Gospel.”[13] The Gospel, in fact, helps to understand better the order of creation that the Son of God assumed, purified, and brought to fulfillment. It also invites us to the mercy and patience of the Lord that gives to each person the time to convert oneself.
10. The new formulation of number 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church desires to give energy to a movement towards a decisive commitment to favor a mentality that recognizes the dignity of every human life and, in respectful dialogue with civil authorities, to encourage the creation of conditions that allow for the elimination of the death penalty where it is still in effect.
The Sovereign Pontiff Francis, in the Audience granted to the undersigned Secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on 28 June 2018, has approved the present Letter, adopted in the Ordinary Session of this Congregation on 13 June 2018, and ordered its publication.
Rome, from the Office of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 1 August 2018, Memorial of Saint Alphonsus Liguori.
Luis F. Card. Ladaria, S.I.
Prefect
X Giacomo Morandi
Titular Archbishop of Cerveteri
Secretary
_________________________
[1] Cf. Francis, Address to participants in the meeting promoted by the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization (11 October 2017): L’Osservatore Romano (13 October 2017), 4.
[2] John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitæ (25 March 1995), n. 9: AAS 87 (1995), 411.
[3] Ibid., n. 27: AAS 87 (1995), 432.
[4] John Paul II, Urbi et Orbi Message of His Holiness Pope John Paul II: Christmas 1998 (25 December 1998), n. 5: Insegnamenti XXI,2 (1998), 1348.
[5] Id., Homily in the Trans World Dome of St. Louis (27 January 1999): Insegnamenti XXII,1 (1999), 269; cf. Homily for Mass in the Basilica of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe in Mexico City (23 January 1999): “There must be an end to the unnecessary recourse to the death penalty”: Insegnamenti XXII,1 (1999), 123.
[6] Benedict XVI, Postsynodal Apostolic Exhortation Africæ munus (19 November 2011), n. 83: AAS 104 (2012), 276.
[7] Id., General Audience (30 November 2011): Insegnamenti VII,2 (2011), 813.
[8] Francis, Letter to the President of the International Commission Against the Death Penalty (20 March 2015): L’Osservatore Romano (20-21 March 2015), 7.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ibid.
[11] Francis, Address to participants in the meeting promoted by the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization (11 October 2017): L’Osservatore Romano (13 October 2017), 5.
[12] Cf. Vincent of Lérins, Commonitorium, cap. 23: PL 50, 667-669. In reference to the death penalty, treating the stipulations of the precepts of the Decalogue, the Pontifical Biblical Commission spoke of the “refinement” of the moral positions of the Church: “In the course of history and of the development of civilization, the Church too, meditating on the Scriptures, has refined her moral stance on the death penalty and on war, which is now becoming more and more absolute. Underlying this stance, which may seem radical, is the same anthropological basis, the fundamental dignity of the human person, created in the image of God.” (The Bible and Morality: Biblical Roots of Christian Conduct, 2008, n. 98).
[13] Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, The Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, n. 4.

-http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2018/08/02/180802b.html

The amendment quotes Pope Francis' words from a speech on October 11, 2017. Pope Francis claims that the effectiveness of detention systems and the unchanging dignity of the person is enough for all to disregard the use of capital punishment.

Many in "conservative" Catholic circles have voiced their disappointment at the amendment and are using this to further their case that Pope Francis is a heretic. Other Catholics praise the changes and say they were needed.

It is important to note that the new text does not completely do away with the death penalty. It just says that it is "inadmissible" or not tolerated. The new text does not say it is an intrinsic evil. In fact, the wording reflects the teachings of Saint Pope John Paul II who stated that the death penalty should not be used. The Catholic Church has always been against the death penalty but acknowledged that legitimate authorities had a right to protect the common good from aggressive persons.




Source:
http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2018/08/02/180802b.html

http://www.ewtnnews.com/catholic-news/Vatican.php?id=17938

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s2c2a5.htm

http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2018/08/02/180802a.html

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pope-shifts-church-death-penalty-now-inadmissible-56983512

https://www.yahoo.com/news/pope-shifts-church-death-penalty-103647335.html

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-45042130

https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2018/08/02/live-sister-helen-prejean-pope-francis-revision-death-penalty-teaching

Atheist Killer Faces Death Penalty

Craigs Hicks, or the North Carolina atheist who killed three young Muslims may possibly face the death penalty. Hicks confessed to the shootings.  Search warrants found large amounts of guns and ammunition at his home.

An investigation is still ongoing as to whether or not Hicks' act was a hate crime or just a dispute over parking. Hicks was known as a "hot head" in the neighborhood and argued over parking spaces.  However, he never shot and killed anyone until these 3 young Muslims came along.  Two of them were female and wore their traditional Muslim garb. It seems clear that Hicks discriminated against these three Muslims and his anger and hatred for religion amplified his reaction which led to the murder of these three young kids.

Moreover, the autopsies done on the bodies of the three Muslim victims indicated that two of them had the gun pointed directly at the heads.  This means that Hicks intentionally wanted to murder them with a shot to the head.  Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha and Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha died of close gunshots to the head.  Hicks placed his gun directly on their scalps or close and shot them execution style.  One was shot in the top of the head and the other on the back of the head.  Note that these two victims were female so they looked "Muslim" in regards to their traditional garb.  The male and husband of Yusor, Deah Shaddy died of multiple shots to his body.

The manner in which the two young girls were killed and the multiple shots directed at the male clearly shows that Hicks was angry and wanted them gone.  Hate is the strongest form of anger.  It makes sense that Hicks committed a hate crime and targeted these young people because they were Muslims.  Moreover, he never got to this violent point with other neighbors whom he argued with over the same thing, parking.

 
See more: http://www.sacerdotus.com/2015/02/atheist-kills-young-muslims.html





Source:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/2-of-3-north-carolina-muslim-students-shot-with-gun-held-to-head/

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/nc-man-craig-hicks-charged-killing-3-muslims-can-face-n336676

http://www.universityherald.com/articles/18708/20150506/craig-hicks-shot-3-muslim-nc-students-in-head-autopsy-report-confirms.htm

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/autopsies-muslim-students-shot-gun-held-head-30842810

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/06/us/north-carolina-craig-hicks-muslim-students-murder-death-penalty/

Boston Bomber Guilty

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 21 who along with his brother Tamerlan, 26 terrorized Boston in 2013 was found guilty of all 30 counts charged against him.  The courtroom was silent as the verdict was read one by one which lasted 25 minutes.  Tsarnaev had no expression and made little eye contact with the jury. The penalty phase is now underway which may bring the death penalty to Dezhokhar Tsarnaev.

Victims and Bostonians waited two years for this verdict. After suffering the loss of four lives and the many injuries have others endured, the verdict brings some closure. Lawyers for Tsarnaev, while admitting he was guilty, tried to place the blame on his older brother Tamerlan.  They claimed that Tamerlan brainwashed his impressional young brother into joining him in the attack.  Both attended the Boston marathon with backpacks containing pressure cookers.  In these pressure cookers were sharp metallic objects and other substances that would trigger an explosion. The explosion would cause damage not only from the blast, but from the shrapnel that would burst from it.

Krystle Campbell 29, Sean Collier 27, Lingzi Lu 23, Martin Richard 8
http://www.sacerdotus.com/2013/04/boston-victims-let-us-not-forget.html 

After the attack, many people provided photos of the marathon along with descriptions of the suspects. All this information led to the quick identification of the Tsarnaev brothers. Once both learned they were being sought by the authorities, they began to flee which started perhaps the biggest manhunt in Boston's history. Tamerlan was shot dead by police while his younger brother, Dzhokhar who was 19 at the time fled. The manhunt was televised on every network nearly for a whole day. 19-year-old Dzhokhar was apprehended at 67 Franklin st in Watertown, MA.  He was found in a boat injured and bloody.  The homeowner noticed the tarp on the boat was torn and went to investigate.  He found a man all bloody in the boat which turned out to be Dzhokar.  Dzhokhar was alive and had gunshots to the neck and leg.

My prayers go to all involved including these brothers. As Christians, we are called to forgive no matter the sin or crime done to us. I personally do not believe the death penalty will serve any good in this case. Perhaps a life sentence will allow Dzhokar to recall his actions and how he wasted his young life all for nothing.







Source:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/09/us/dzhokhar-tsarnaev-verdict-boston-marathan-bombing-trial.html?_r=0

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/boston-marathon-bomber-dzhokhar-tsarnaev-guilty-of-multiple-counts/