No one who has read this blog for long thinks that I am a fan of Joe Biden. I have said more than once that I think Biden is a politician who is corrupt to the core and uses his political office for the financial benefit of his family. But even a blind pig finds an acorn every once in a while, so I have to give Biden credit where credit is due.

On December 23, right before Christmas, President Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 federal inmates. Biden’s action took place a couple of weeks after Pope Francis made a specific appeal that authorities in the U. S. would commute the sentences of prisoners on death row. On December 8, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, Francis said, “Today, it come to my heart to ask all of you to pray for the prisoners in the United States who are on death row. Let’s pray that their sentences would be commuted (or) changed. Let us think of these brothers and sisters of ours and ask the Lord for the grace to save them from death.” Whether Biden’s action was in response to the plea of Pope Francis is impossible to know, unless Biden tells us outright, and he hasn’t so far. On December 20, three days before Biden commuted the sentences of the death row inmates, Biden and Pope Francis spoke over the phone. It’s likely Francis repeated his plea.

Biden has taken a lot of criticism for this action, from both the right and the left. However, inspired by Biden’s actions, Democrat Governor Roy Cooper of North Carolina has commuted the death sentences of 15 death row inmates in his state. There remain 3 people on federal death row and 121 on death row in North Carolina. So, neither action demonstrates a rejection of the death penalty, but it is a start.

The death penalty remains favored by a majority in the United States. According to a 2021 Pew survey, 60% of Americans favor the death penalty, even while 78% believe there is some risk of innocent people being put to death. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, 200 people who were on death row have been exonerated since 1973. That’s a ratio of 8:1 – those executed : those exonerated. It is almost certain that at least some innocent people have been executed in the United States. That alone should give us pause when considering support for the death penalty. When we can keep people behind bars for the rest of their lives, safe from contact with society, is the death penalty justified when we know that we are going to execute at least some innocent people?

Here are some other realities to consider regarding the death penatly:

In 2018, a record 111 people on death row in the United States were exonerated. In those cases, perjury, false accusations, and offical misconduct were the leading causes of wrongful convictions. Notice, not mistaken identifications or misremembered events. But perjury and false accusations. In other words, witnesses lied while giving testimony, and those lies led to a person being convicted and sentenced to death. Also official misconduct. In other words, the authorities leading the investigation purposefully mishandled, falsified, or kept to themselves evidence that would have exonerated the person eventually sentenced to death. Misconduct by police and/or prosecutors was the cause of a person being convicted and sentenced to death in 79% of those 2018 exonerations. In 50 of the 111 2018 cases, the person convicted and sentenced to death was falsely accused of a crime that never happened.

It is also true that most people who are convicted and sentenced to death are more often those who are too poor to hire adequate defense attorneys. It is also true that non-Whites are more likely to be prosectued for capital murder, sentenced to death, and executed, especially if their victim was White. 75% of those sentenced to death were those convicted of murdering a White person, even though about half of homicide victims in the US are Black.

The bottom line is: the death penalty places society at too great a risk of executing an innocent person. The death penalty is too often imposed on those who are wrongly convicted. The death penalty is also administered arbitrarily, with those who are poor and people of color being sentenced to death and executed far more than are wealthy White people, even for the same crimes.

The Catchecism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 2267, as revised in 2018, states:

“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’, and she works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”

A lot of people would like to think that a person who commits an unspeakable crime somehow loses their intrinsic dignity as a child of God. This is not true. All persons are made in the image of God, and that imago Dei is not lost, even when one made in God’s image commits a crime that causes all to retreat in horror.

A lot of people would like to think that not imposing the death penalty on a person who commits an unspeakable crime is the same as being “soft” on crime. That is not true. A life behind bars does not constitute being “soft” on crime. I suspect that few criminals, given the choice, would prefer a life in prison to being free. Prison is no paradise. Prison, in fact, is a very dangerous place to be. One’s freedom is obviously considerably curtailed and individual rights are rarely acknowledged by the authorities.

A lot of people would like to think that not imposing the death penalty is being cruel to the victims of crime. This is not true. The notion that not killing the criminal is being cruel to the victim is a cynical notion. No one has rights over another person’s life. No one is entitled to see another person killed. The idea that one does is little less than assuming the place of God over another, and no one merits that place, not even the victim of a most horrible crime, or the victim’s surviving family. The place of forgiveness in God’s plan of redemption is as much for the victim as for the perpetuator of the offense. Perhaps moreso. No one gets into the kingdom by demanding retribution over another and remaining unsatisfied until that retribution is accomplished. That’s not how the ethics of the gospel work.

A lot of people would like to think that not imposing the death penalty is justifying crime. This is not true. Not killing the murderer is not justifying their crime. How could one think so? Is the only sentence worthy of murder the killing of the murderer? Otherwise, justice is denied? No! We would do well to distance ourselves from the idea that killing people is the only, or even the best, way to manage difficult people, or even horrible people, or even evil people. Killing people cannot be accomplished without some impact on those who do the killing. It effects people. It effects society. Better to deal with evil in some other way than to try to stamp it out by killing. For one thing, it doesn’t work. Evil still thrives. For another, it impacts the killer, and not in a good way. Even if one is killing another person as an act of justice toward one who has received a fair trial and a sentence imposed by a fair jury and judge, the killing itself cannot be done without impacting the one who is killing, and not in a good way. It cannot be done without impacting the society that does the killing, and not in a good way. God is not praised by the killing of one made in His image, even if that one acts contrary to that image in such a way that the image is almost impossible to find. Even still, God’s image is there.

It is time to move beyond the death penalty. It is time to recognize the image of God in all, even the one who commits an unspeakable crime. It is time to extend the gospel of mercy even to those who had no mercy on their victims, as Christ extended His mercy even on those who crucified Him.

Be Christ for all. Bring Christ to all. See Christ in all.