Versions began 1997, last update 8/2026
Religion & The Death Penalty
aka The Catholic Church's Horrendous Anti-death Run, 1995 Forward
Dudley Sharp, independent researcher, death penalty expert, former opponent, 832-439-2113, CV at bottom
Preface
Here are 4000 (a guesstimate) pro death penalty factual, philosophical, biblical and theological references, which either
1) support the death penalty and/or which
2) refute the factual, biblical and/or theological objections to the death penalty.
the 4000 includes presented articles, footnotes from those articles, and on and on, through those additional footnoted articles and their footnotes.
NOTE: Proper Translation and Meaning
It is important to look at biblical commentators, regarding any biblical text.
This has up to 40 different commentaries, per biblical text. Use them.
For 4,500 years (biblical timeline), the death penalty has had religious support, starting with Genesis 9:5-6. Anti-death penalty teachings did not occur, in major Christian denominations, until the 1950's, with the Roman Catholic Church not joining that chorus until 2018 - 4500 years after Genesis 9:6.
Did the bible or basic theology, suddenly change? Of course not, as reviewed, in detail.
US Catholic Dioceses and Archdiocese have been receiving versions of these since 1997.
Through today and for more than 4500 years, there has been Noahic, Mosaic, Torah, Old Testament and Christian New Testament support for the death penalty, from Genesis to Revelation, from Jesus to St. Dismas, from the Holy Ghost (Ananias & Saphirra) to the greatest of Popes, Saints, Doctors and Fathers of the Church, church leadership, biblical and theological scholars, which, in breadth and depth, overwhelms any teachings to the contrary, particularly those wrongly dependent upon the Church not knowing of human dignity, until the 21st century, and upon the secular concerns, such as defense of society and the poor standards of criminal justice systems in protecting the innocent, which reference the blatant errors within Evangelium Vitae and the 1997/2018 amendments to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 22667, as detailed:
NOTE: Go to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops website
and enter "death penalty" in their search box. Everything which pops up is defeated, within this review, Religion and the Death Penalty. It will take you awhile to research, fact check and vet, everything, but you will be way ahead of the Church, which chose to avoid that process since, at least, 1995.
Pope Francis Drove the Last Spike Through the Church's Anti-death Penalty Era, with this:
Pope Francis: "(Capital executions,) "far from bringing justice, fuel a sense of revenge that becomes a dangerous poison for the body of our civil societies," Pope Francis wrote, August, 2024 ("Death penalty fuels 'poison' of revenge in society, pope says", US Conference of Catholic Bishops, https://www.usccb.org/news/2024/death-penalty-fuels-poison-revenge-society-pope-says)
Neither the Pope, nor anyone at the Vatican, nor anyone within the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops seems to be aware that the Church claims that She cannot teach moral error, which is, of course, contradicted by Francis, who tells us the Church has been teaching moral error for over 2000 years, which requires bringing into question how wrong the Church may have been with all other of Her teaching for over 2000 years. Basic.
That, factually and morally, defines the Catholic Church's disastrous anti-death penalty era, 1995 forward, as detailed, with no rebuttal nor correction, from the Church, since 1995, as detailed, herein:
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If you have a specific issue, just let me know.
1) The Catholic Church & The Death Penalty
13 (15) Factual Errors: 2018 CCC 2267 amendment
update: Pope Francis asserts, that for 2000 years. the most respected Fathers and Doctors of the Church, popes and saints, other Church leadership, Catholic biblical and theological scholars, taught "poison" to the Catholic faithful, because of death penalty support, thus destroying confidence in any Catholic teachings. Vatican News, July 18, 2024,
2) Saint/Pope John Paul II marks the beginning of the Catholic Church's disastrous anti-death penalty run, 1995 forward, intentionally, avoiding the most basic of reason, research, fact checking and vetting, as detailed, throughout:
Pope John Paul II: His death penalty errors
3) Catechism & The Death Penalty Problems: Section 2267:
A Rational Deconstruction of Catholic Revisionism, 1995-2019
Saint Pope John II (SPJPII) made a prudential judgement, within EV, and such judgement had ,very, obvious factual and rational errors and, then, those errors were amended into CCC 2267.
I do not believe that a prudential judgment has ever been entered into a Catechism, before, as such is contrary to the purpose of a catechism, ". . . a text which contains the fundamental Christian truths formulated in a way that facilitates their understanding." (USCCB).
The amended 2267 is a solid example of the opposite of that purpose and why a prudential judgement should never have been placed within a Catechism and, hopefully, such will not occur, again, with these CCC errors, ultimately, corrected.
I do not believe that a prudential judgment has ever been entered into a Catechism, before, as such is contrary to the purpose of a catechism, ". . . a text which contains the fundamental Christian truths formulated in a way that facilitates their understanding." (USCCB).
The amended 2267 is a solid example of the opposite of that purpose and why a prudential judgement should never have been placed within a Catechism and, hopefully, such will not occur, again, with these CCC errors, ultimately, corrected.
4) Catechism & State Protection: The Gross Negligence of the Holy See
The Church/SPJPII call the following cases "very rare if not practically non-existent.”
In modern criminal justice systems, from 1973-2026 in the US:
20,000 ADDITIONAL innocents were murdered by those KNOWN murderers that we allowed to murder, again -recidivist murderers.
500,000 ADDITIONAL innocents were murdered by those KNOWN criminals that we allowed to harm, again - recidivist criminals, which equates to
3.5 million ADDITIONAL innocents were raped, robbed or otherwise assaulted by those KNOWN criminals that we allowed to harm, again - recidivist criminals
and on and on and on, in the US, alone, and magnified throughout the world, as the Church must know.
The Church abandons the innocent victims, again. She cannot help Herself from doing so.
5) Three questions for Catholic opponents of capital punishment,
Dr. Edward Feser, Catholic World Report, 9/15/2019,
"Pope Francis' conclusions are not only absurd, they are obscene."
6) Catholic Leaders Misinterpret Holy Scriptures on Capital Punishment in Breathtaking Ways, The Stream, Dr. Jules Gomes BA, BD, MTh, PhD, June 10, 2024
https://stream.org/catholic-leaders-misinterpret-holy-scriptures-on-capital-punishment-in-breathtaking-ways/
“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ,” St. Jerome
Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, " . . . displayed his cavernous ignorance of the Holy Bible in a recent pronouncement on the death penalty."
Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, " . . . displayed his cavernous ignorance of the Holy Bible in a recent pronouncement on the death penalty."
7) Francis Uses Junk Theology to End the Death Penalty, Monica Miller, Crisis Magazine, August 6, 2018, https://crisismagazine.com/opinion/francis-junk-theology-end-death-penalty
Miller states the obvious, somehow missed by Pope Francis, but she leaves out many of the other, obvious issues, detailed, throughout this review.
8a) The Death Penalty: Mercy, Expiation, Redemption & Salvation
Romano Amerio: Some opposing capital punishment ". . . go on to assert that a life should not be ended because that would remove the possibility of making expiation, is to ignore the great truth that capital punishment is itself expiatory."
and
8b) "Judaism's Pro-Death Penalty Tradition", Steven Plaut, PhD, Haifa University, Apr. 23, 2004 article for JewishPress.com found here:
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2026/01/judaisms-pro-death-penalty-tradition.html
". . . capital punishment is regarded by Judaism as a favor for the capital sinner, a form of atonement and redemption." "Ordinary murderers are allowed to achieve atonement for their souls in their execution. " " . . . execution preserves human dignity, it does not defile it."
"The Bible makes it crystal clear that the way one acknowledges that human souls are created in God`s image and deserving of respect and dignity is through capital punishment. Not just among Jews, by the way, but among all sons of Noah. " . . . the preservation of human dignity requires capital punishment of convicted murderers. It is precisely because of man`s creation in God`s image that capital punishment is declared justified and necessary."
"(Capital punishment) should be implemented because it represents a great moral statement." "It is the moral and ethical thing to do." "Capital punishment represents a moral and just vengeance. It represents a declaration of good and evil."
"It is for this moral reason that traditional Judaism unambiguously endorses the death penalty for premeditated murder ."
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2026/01/judaisms-pro-death-penalty-tradition.html
". . . capital punishment is regarded by Judaism as a favor for the capital sinner, a form of atonement and redemption." "Ordinary murderers are allowed to achieve atonement for their souls in their execution. " " . . . execution preserves human dignity, it does not defile it."
"The Bible makes it crystal clear that the way one acknowledges that human souls are created in God`s image and deserving of respect and dignity is through capital punishment. Not just among Jews, by the way, but among all sons of Noah. " . . . the preservation of human dignity requires capital punishment of convicted murderers. It is precisely because of man`s creation in God`s image that capital punishment is declared justified and necessary."
"(Capital punishment) should be implemented because it represents a great moral statement." "It is the moral and ethical thing to do." "Capital punishment represents a moral and just vengeance. It represents a declaration of good and evil."
"It is for this moral reason that traditional Judaism unambiguously endorses the death penalty for premeditated murder ."
9) Jesus and the Death Penalty
As Cardinal Avery Dulles, SJ states: "At no point, however, does Jesus deny that the State has authority to exact capital punishment. In his debates with the Pharisees, Jesus cites with approval the apparently harsh commandment, He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die (Mt 15:4; Mk 7:10, referring to Ex 21:17; cf. Lev 20:9)." "Jesus commends the good thief on the cross next to Him, who has admitted that he and his fellow thief are receiving the due reward of their deeds (Lk 23:41). "
10) Death Penalty: Catholic Ignorance Again and Again and Again
11) Does the Death Penalty Conflict with traditional Catholic Principles?
Society of Saint Pius X, October 15, 2017,
This shows how both John Paul II and Pope Francis are fully contradicted by the Church's traditional teachings and how and why those teachings, by fact and reason, are far stronger than the very weak changes that both Popes adavnced.
12) Pro Life: The Death Penalty
The death penalty/executions protect and save innocent lives, in six ways, better than life without parole (LWOP), meaning dead penalty abolition equals many more innocent murders, which brings about this reality, just below.
Based upon biblical and theological teachings, as well as secular realities, one can, reasonably and accurately, find the death penalty pro-life.
13) 30 Examples:
How Death Penalty Opponents Value
Murderers More Than Their Innocent Victims
Complete Rebuttal of Sir Richard Branson
Well known anti-death penalty scholars/leaders "(Charles) Black and (Hugo Adam) Bedau said they would favor abolishing the death penalty even if they knew that doing so would increase the homicide rate by 1,000 percent." (7), meaning they prefer an ADDITIONAL 9 milli0n innocents murdered (1973-2023), in exchange for saving the lives of 1500 capital murderers.
Grotesque and part of the pattern, as detailed.
14) See para 13, "Unnatural Lawyering", first, then start at the beginning:
By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment
"Feser systematically refutes the arguments of those who think the Church now teaches that capital punishment is intrinsically unjust. He helps readers to see how weak our attachment to justice has become and how little we allow tight reasoning about justice to govern our thinking…"
" . . . the book simply flattens (death penalty) opponents." "(Bessette) uses this data to refute claims made by the (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) that capital punishment has no deterrent power, that innocent persons are regularly executed, that the application of the death penalty has been unfairly applied to minorities and the poor."
"This leaves the Catholic who claims that the death penalty is always and intrinsically evil with two options. He can give up this extreme claim. (He might still hold that capital punishment is a bad idea in practice – I’m not addressing that question here.) Or he can give up the Church’s claims about the authority of scripture and tradition – which is really to give up Catholicism itself, since this would undermine the Church’s foundation in the deposit of faith. There is no third option, and it is sophistry to pretend otherwise."
15) The Legitimacy of Capital Punishment,
by Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.,
https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?id=6871&repos=1&subrepos=0&searchid=1486390
16) Forgiveness and Murder
http://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2012/10/forgiveness-and-murder-compiled-and.html
If we go by biblical instruction, it includes that the wrongdoer confess their wrong, find honest sorrow and remorse and state that they will do all they can to not harm again - to change their ways, prior to any forgiveness being given, by the specific party harmed.
To forgive those who have not repented is to give approval of what they have done, while rejecting the importance of responsibility and atonement. It would not be mercy, but insult.
17) The Death Penalty: Neither Hatred nor Revenge
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2017/05/death-penalty-revenge.html
Neither the judges nor jurors can have any connection to the individuals or circumstances of the murders, must presume the defendant innocent, until (or if) proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, with laws and sanctions that existed prior to the murders . . . laws outside the control of the judge or jurors, within a system that provides super due process, in pre-trial, trial, appeals and executive consideration within pardons or commutation, offering greater protections and safeguards than with any other sanction,- with the jury having to vote 48-0 (4 votes for the 12 jurors), 100%, against the defendant/murderer in order to get a death penalty, but only 1 out of that 48, 2%, needs to be for the defendant/murderer, to evade the death penalty, all of which exclude a revenge component.
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2017/05/death-penalty-revenge.html
Neither the judges nor jurors can have any connection to the individuals or circumstances of the murders, must presume the defendant innocent, until (or if) proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, with laws and sanctions that existed prior to the murders . . . laws outside the control of the judge or jurors, within a system that provides super due process, in pre-trial, trial, appeals and executive consideration within pardons or commutation, offering greater protections and safeguards than with any other sanction,- with the jury having to vote 48-0 (4 votes for the 12 jurors), 100%, against the defendant/murderer in order to get a death penalty, but only 1 out of that 48, 2%, needs to be for the defendant/murderer, to evade the death penalty, all of which exclude a revenge component.
18) Sister Helen Prejean:
Her Lies, Deceptions and/or Astounding Willful Ignorance? - A Compilation
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2023/04/sister-helen-prejean-her-lies_15.html
"Devinci's investigative research indicates that Prejean's "Dead Man Walking" is not honest."
Prejean's next book, "Thee Death of Innocents" ' . . . is moreover riddled with factual errors and misrepresentations.” ” . . . despite repeated claims that (Prejean) cares about crime victims, she implies that the victim’s husband was a more likely suspect but was overlooked because the authorities wanted to convict a black man.”
Truly foul.
” . . . a Federal District Court . . . stated that ‘the evidence against Williams was overwhelming.’ " “The same court also did “not find any evidence of racial bias specific to this case.”
and on and on and on
19) Is The Catholic Mobilization Network (CMN) a Lying Institution or . . . ?
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2024/12/is-catholic-mobilization-network-lying.html
All of CMN's anti-death penalty claims are either rebutted or the pro-death penalty positions are shown to be stronger, here:
Research, w/sources, w/fact checking/vetting & critical thinking, as required of everyone in a public policy debate and which rebut all anti-death penalty claims.
The media/academic norm is to use anti-death penalty material, refuse to fact check or vet it and avoid all pro-death penalty research and experts. How will you know that is true? Dead on:
The Death Penalty: Justice & Saving More Innocents
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-death-penalty-justice-saving-more.html
and
Students, Academics & Journalists: Death Penalty Research
(7 pro-death penalty experts are included)
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2022/01/students-death-penalty-research.html
600+ pro death penalty quotes from murder victim's families &
3300+ from some of the greatest thinkers in history
http://prodpquotes.info/
20) Catholic/Journalism /Elizabeth Bruenig/The Atlantic Anti-Death Penalty Nonsense . . . Never Ends
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2025/07/catholic-anti-death-penalty-nonsense.html
"Within (Christian) moral order, we believe that both justice and mercy are to be operative. It is not enough to so concentrate on, the practice of merciful charity as to overlook or ignore the corresponding practice of justice. Nor is it pertinent to say that 'capital punishment does not in the least redress the injustice committed against the murdered victim or anyone else.' On the contrary, capital punishment does help to redress the injustice committed both against the murdered victim and, esp6cially, against the Someone Else who is God." see para 15
21) Anti-Victim/Anti-Death Penalty Movement
https://prodpi7nnc.blogspot.com/2014/04/anti-victim-anti-death-penalty-movement.html
The anti-death penalty strategy and mantra could well be: "Our efforts are so cruel to murder victim's families, you must stop the death penalty".
https://prodpi7nnc.blogspot.com/2014/04/anti-victim-anti-death-penalty-movement.html
The anti-death penalty strategy and mantra could well be: "Our efforts are so cruel to murder victim's families, you must stop the death penalty".
22) What Did Jesus Teach about Violence and Turning the Other Cheek?
by: J. Daryl Charles, Timothy J. Demy, Crossway, May 16, 2014,
https://www.crossway.org/articles/what-did-jesus-teach-about-violence-and-turning-the-other-cheek/
" . . . Jesus is challenging his listeners to consider their attitudes so that they respond properly to personal injustice or insult. That insult (personal injury) rather than assault (public injury) is at issue here is suggested by the mention of the right cheek being struck. And it is clarified by the further illustration, “If someone wants to . . . take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well” (Matthew 5:40). Handling insults and matters of clothing (a basic human need) are not the realm of statecraft and public policy."
"Even when Jesus forbids the sword as a means to advance the kingdom of God, the New Testament does not teach an absolute or principled pacifism. Nor does it forbid the Christian from “bearing the sword”— or serving as a magistrate, for that matter—in the service of society and the greater good of the community."
23) "The Death Penalty”, Chapter XXVI, 187. The death penalty, from the book Iota Unum, by Romano Amerio, domid.blogspot.com/2007/05/amerio-on-capital-punishment.html
titled “Amerio on capital punishment “, May 25, 2007
Thoughtful deconstruction of current Roman Catholic teaching on capital punishment by a faithful Catholic Vatican insider. Romano Amerio was an episcopal consultant to the Central Preparatory Commission of Vatican II and was a peritus for the Bishop of Lugano during the Council. A true insider to the Council's activities. He was Italian by nationality, was a man of broad and classical erudition, who taught philosophy, Greek and Latin at the Academy of Lugano, Switzerland from 1928 to 1970.
24) Full Rebuttal: John 8 - Jesus and the Death Penalty
https://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2024/07/full-rebuttal-how-jesus-position-on.html
and
John 8: The Woman Caught in Adultery – Dealing with Capital Offenses Lawfully
https://www.oocities.org/theonomistic/adultry.html
and
The Woman Caught in Adultery, the Death Penalty & John 8:2-11
http://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2013/06/the-woman-caught-in-adultery-death.html
Somehow Evans, The Church and many others, are unaware of what "God demands" with the accounting for murder being that the murderer's blood "SHALL" be shed, "For in the image of God have human beings been made."
25) Capital Punishment and Magisterial Authority”
"Fastiggi on Capital Punishment and the Change to the Catechism,
Part I," Edward Feser, 8/6/2023,
Part II, Edward Feser, 8/30/2023
Part I: " . . . the (CCC 2267, 2018) revision focuses only on statements from the tradition that seem unfavorable towards capital punishment while entirely ignoring the mountain of statements from scripture, the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and previous popes that are clearly favorable to it. The revision also entirely ignores the empirical considerations favoring the judgment that there are at least some cases where public safety would best be served by keeping the death penalty on the books. The revision thereby gives the impression that capital punishment is intrinsically wrong, and that social scientists are in agreement that it is never needed in order to save lives – neither of which is true."
Part II: " . . . even Catholic scholar E. Christian Brugger, who is not only opposed to capital punishment but would like the Church to go as far as condemning it as intrinsically immoral, admits that there is what he calls a “patristic consensus” on the thesis that capital punishment is legitimate at least in principle, even among those who opposed resorting to it in practice (Capital Punishment and Roman Catholic Moral Tradition, p. 95)."
" . . . in A Treatise on the Soul, Tertullian says that “we do not account those to be violent deaths which justice awards, that avenger of violence.” Lactantius, in The Divine Institutes, acknowledges that a man can be “justly condemned to [be] slain.” In Ad Demetrianum, Cyprian indicates that if Christianity really were a crime, the state would justly “put the man that confesses it to death.” These Fathers did indeed nevertheless oppose the use of the death penalty in practice, but they do not teach that it is intrinsically wrong."
"Genesis 9:6 famously states: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for God made man in his own image.” This passage has for millennia been understood by Catholic and Jewish commentators as sanctioning the death penalty, and as Bessette and I show at pp. 99-101 of our book, there is no plausible alternative way of reading it."
" . . . the Old Testament merely permits, but does not require, slavery and polygamy. The Israelites are not told that they must take slaves or marry more than one woman. They are told at most only that if they do these things, then there are certain conditions they must follow. By contrast, the use of the death penalty is positively commanded many times in the Old Testament. Moreover, these commands are not ad hoc in nature, directed to some specific temporary purpose (as are divine directives to the Israelites to destroy this or that pagan city, say). Rather, the Mosaic Law makes the death penalty a standing and normal part of the everyday life of the nation of Israel."
"Hence, if capital punishment were intrinsically or of its very nature “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,” we would be left with the conclusion that scripture not only permitted, but positively commanded the Israelites to set up the very structure of their society in a manner that was inherently and gravely contrary to the good of human beings. We would be left with the conclusion that scripture thereby led the Israelites into grave moral error. But that is not possible given the Church’s doctrine that scripture cannot teach moral error."
26) “Capital Punishment: What the Bible Says”, Dr. Lloyd R. Bailey,
Abingdon Press, 1987. A definitive biblical review of the death penalty.
"All interpretations, contrary to t7e biblical support of capital punishment, are false. Interpreters ought to listen to the Bible’s own agenda, rather than to squeeze from it implications for their own agenda. As the ancient rabbis taught, “Do not seek to be more righteous than your Creator.’ (Ecclesiastes Rabbah 7.33.)."
27) “The Purpose of Punishment (in the Catholic tradition)”, by R. Michael Dunningan, J.D., J.C.L., CHRISTIFIDELIS, Vol.21,No.4, sept 14, 2003
or
"If the Pope were to deny that the death penalty could be an exercise of retributive justice, he would be overthrowing the tradition of two millennia of Catholic thought, denying the teaching of several previous popes, and contradicting the teaching of Scripture." — Avery Cardinal Dulles
Dunnigan looks at both sides of the religious debate. What he doesn't do is to condemn the factual and rational errors of Pope John Paul II (para 2&3). How and why?
28) “God’s Justice and Ours” by Antonin Scalia, First Things, 5/2002
29) Forgotten Truths: “Is The Church Against Abortion and The Death Penalty”, by Luiz Sergio Solimeo, Crusade Magazine, p14-16, May/June 2007
Pope Pius XII (1939-1958) in his speech of March 13, 1943 to the parish priests of Rome: “God … the fountain of justice reserved to himself the right over life and death. … Human life is untouchable except for legitimate individual self-defense, a just war carried out with just methods, and the death penalty meted out by public authority for extremely grave and very specific and proven crimes”
In another speech, the same Holy Father clarifies: “Even when executing a condemned individual, the State does not have a right over the person’s life. The public authority is empowered to deprive a condemned man of his life to expiate his fault since by his own crime he divested himself from his right to life.”
30) New Testament Death Penalty Support Overwhelming
Saint (& Pope) Pius V, "The just use of (executions), far from involving the crime of murder, is an act of paramount obedience to this (Fifth) Commandment which prohibits murder." "The Roman Catechism of the Council of Trent" (1566).
31) “Capital Punishment: A Catholic Perspective” at
https://sspx.org/en/news/capital-punishment-catholic-perspective-5650
"The error of conceiving capital punishment as a moral evil is pervasive in the Catholic Church today. Arguments against the death penalty, as voiced by Catholics, have a common denominator, namely, the punishment is unchristian. The charge is most unusual because the Church perennially has defended the right of the State to put a criminal to death. In effect the current anti-capital punishment sentiment accuses the Church of uncharitable behavior for two millennia because she has sanctioned the State's right to 'carry the sword,' as St. Paul puts it (Romans 13:4)."
32) Does Truth Matter? Sister Prejean, The Church & U of Notre Dame
It is instructive that the U of Notre Dame would choose Sister Prejean for this chat, as her book, "The Death of Innocents", was a total disaster of inaccuracies, with such the topic of the chat.
33) Call for the Resignation of Pope Francis, 16 signatories, St. Athanasius of Alexandria, May 2, 2024,
With two main issues (explained in detail)
1) Pope Francis has committed criminal acts gravely damaging to the Church and to individual believers.
2. He has shown that he rejects the Catholic faith, and has worked to destroy the faith of other Catholics.
34) The unbearable ugliness of the Catholic Church,
from Catholic author DAMON LINKER, This Week, 29 Aug 2018
https://theweek.com/articles/792775/unbearable-ugliness-catholic-church
"In Erie, a 7-year-old boy was sexually abused by a priest who then told him he should go to confession and confess his "sins" to that same priest. Another boy was repeatedly raped from ages 13 to 15 by a priest who bore down so hard on the boy's back that it caused severe spine injuries. He became addicted to painkillers and later died of an overdose. One victim in Pittsburgh was forced to pose naked as Christ on the cross while priests photographed him with a Polaroid camera. Priests gave the boy and others gold cross necklaces to mark them as being "groomed" for abuse. [The Washington Post]"
and on and on and on . . . .
35) Pope Francis, My Worst Protestant Nightmare, by Carl R. Trueman,
First Things, April 22, 2025
36) Another Christian Anti-death Penalty Disaster
37) Four Catholic Journals Indulge in (anti-death penalty) Doctrinal Solipsism, Steven Long, THOMISTICA, March 5, 2015,
"The editorial manifests a wondrously positivistic indifference to, and disregard for, distinctions in doctrine. That all the Doctors and Fathers of the Church--with the exception of Tertullian who died outside the faith-- have taught the essential validity of capital punishment; and that it is the teaching of the Council of Trent that where all the Fathers and Doctors hold one interpretation of Scripture as the proper one, Catholics are to accept it, are two propositions that signify very little in the oppressive culture of mutationist accounts of doctrinal development."
38) Magisterial Irresponsibility, First Things, 10/18
"The word for doctrinal breaks is heresy. The Church has taught for two millennia that the death penalty is essentially valid. This is taught in Sacred Scripture, and has been affirmed by popes, numerous catechisms, the consensus of the Fathers of the Church, and the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas. If this teaching is erroneous, then the whole of the ordinary universal magisterium of the Church—especially its moral magisterium—is merely a contingent effect of ecclesial will. The nihilistic voluntarism of such a view is incompatible with Catholic faith."
39) Archbishop Chaput: “Both Scripture and long Christian tradition acknowledge the legitimacy of capital punishment . . . " "The Church cannot repudiate (the death penalty) without repudiating her own identity." "Archbishop Chaput clarifies Church’s stance on death penalty", CNA, Catholic News Agency, Oct 18, 2005. Chaput was then archbishop of Denver, now of Philadelphia
40) BISHOPS HIDE TRUTH FROM THEIR FLOCK: DEATH PENALTY
The Nebraska Bishops are presenting error after error, week after week. It is long overdue to end it. They will not. Simply the anti-death penalty norm.
41) Catholic Bishops: So Wrong on Death Penalty
What the Bishops are saying, now, as many others in Church leadership, today, is that for 2000 years the Church has supported a sanction which opposes justice, supports vengeance, takes away human dignity and life's value.
All responsible Catholics know that to be false.
The Church's teachings on the sanction, for over 2000 years, are the exact opposite of what the Bishops are, now, saying, which anyone familiar with Church teachings would know.
The Church's teachings on the sanction, for over 2000 years, are the exact opposite of what the Bishops are, now, saying, which anyone familiar with Church teachings would know.
42) Moral Hypocrisy: European Union & The US Death Penalty
Now that Belgium and, possibly, the EU, are to agree that some children, of any age, are mature enough to invite death, I guess the EU and those US Supreme Court Judges will have to change their opinions on the possibility that 16-17 year old rapist/murderers may discern the error of their ways, to the point that execution may be an option. Well, no. Hypocrisy and irrationality will rule the day.
44) Religion and the Death Penalty, (aka Rebuttal to Albert Camus)
By Walter Berns, The Weekly Standard, February 04, 2008,
45) “At the Death House Door” Can Rev. Carroll Pickett be trusted?
46) CATHOLICISM & CAPITAL PUNISHMENT,
by Avery Cardinal Dulles, First Things, April 2001,
"No passage in the New Testament disapproves of the death penalty." "In the Old Testament the Mosaic Law specifies no less than thirty-six capital offenses calling for execution . . .".
"The death penalty was considered especially fitting as a punishment for murder since in his covenant with Noah God had laid down the principle, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in His own image” (Genesis 9:6)."
"In his debates with the Pharisees, Jesus cites with approval the apparently harsh commandment, “He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die” (Matthew 15:4; Mark 7:10, referring to Exodus 2l:17; cf. Leviticus 20:9)."
"Turning to Christian tradition, we may note that the Fathers and Doctors of the Church are virtually unanimous in their support for capital punishment." Saint Augustine writes in The City of God: "Since the agent of authority is but a sword in the hand, and is not responsible for the killing, it is in no way contrary to the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill” to wage war at God’s bidding, or for the representatives of the State’s authority to put criminals to death, according to law or the rule of rational justice."
" . . . leading canonists and theologians assert the right of civil courts to pronounce the death penalty for very grave offenses such as murder and treason. Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus invoke the authority of Scripture and patristic tradition, and give arguments from reason."
"When Pilate calls attention to his authority to crucify him, Jesus points out that Pilate’s power comes to him from above-that is to say, from God (John 19:11).
Jesus commends the good thief on the cross next to him, who has admitted that he and his fellow thief are receiving the due reward of their deeds (Luke 23:41)."
I rebut all of Dulles' review of the secular "facts" of the death penalty, here (1). Sadly, he didn't stick to his own identity: " I am here addressing the subject as a theologian." He made no efforts to fact check nor vet the false anti-death penalty and secular objections to the death penalty, just as the Church. I do (1).
47) The Death Penalty: Fair and Just
http://prodpinnc.blogspot.com/2013/12/is-death-peanalty-fairjust.html Reviews race, ethnicity, class, gender and others.
48) Pre-Constantine Death Penalty Support
49) Judaism & the Death Penalty
50) All Catholics May Support the Death Penalty
51) Quakers & The Death Pen8alty
52) “The Death Penalty”, by Solange Strong Hertz at
53) A Refutation of the ELCA Social Statement on the Death Penalty
54) Is There a Biblical Requirement for Two Eyewitnesses for Criminal Prosecution?
55) The Death Penalty: Justice & Saving More Innocents
56) The Death Row "Exonerated"/"Innocent" Frauds
71-83% Error Rate in Death Row "Innocent" Claims, Well Known Since 2000
57) Sister Catherine Nichol (Billings), Letter: Death penalty isn't the Christian way, Billings Gazette, April 01, 2009
58) Archbishop McKnight: Just Another Anti-death Penalty Disaster
59) The Evils of Cain - some fascinating essays
Did Cain Get Away with Murder?
2014, Biblical Archaeology Review
The Evils of Cain
Cain and His Family
From the Fall to the Flood
The Book of Jasher, Read Chapters 1-5,
See a review of the Book of Jasher, here:
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FN
1) Research, w/sources, w/fact checking/vetting & critical thinking, as required of everyone in a public policy debate and which rebut all anti-death penalty claims or which prove the pro death penalty positions are stronger, within every issue.
The media/academic norm is to use anti-death penalty material, refuse to fact check or vet it and/or avoid all pro-death penalty research and experts or pretend that is the case. How will you know that is true? Read on.
The Death Penalty: Justice & Saving More Innocents
and
Students, Academics & Journalists: Death Penalty Research
(7 pro-death penalty experts are included)
600+ pro death penalty quotes from murder victim's families &
3300+ from some of the greatest thinkers in history
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Victim Services
Victims' Voices
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Partial CV
Maybe future edits, below
“Catholic and other Christian References: Support for the Death Penalty”, at
“MOST CATHOLICS OPPOSE CAPITAL PUNISHMENT?”, KARL KEATING’S E-LETTER, Catholic Answers, March 2, 2004
“THOUGHTS ON THE BISHOPS’ MEETING: NOWADAYS, VOTERS IGNORE BISHOPS” , KARL KEATING’S E-LETTER, Catholic Answers,, Nov. 22, 2005
