The Death Penalty

One charge often leveled against pro-lifers is that they are inconsistent. They only oppose abortion, and that they support war and the death penalty, don't care about social welfare, don't help the women and children after the child is born, and so on.

Of course, that charge is false. All you need do is look at the Catholics who have an extensive network of hospital, health clinics, homeless shelters, food pantries, clothes closets, and more. They do care.

Moreover, the critics try to make each issue of equal weight. This is a false comparison. Not all issues have  the same absolute nature like intentional abortion, which is never morally permitted. Prudential judgment comes into play with many of the other issues. And abortion is immediate and in the U.S. claims just under a million lives a year. No other issue involves the immediate killing of so many.

Take the death penalty, for example.

The number of people who might be subject to the death penalty under current law is relatively small. Indeed, the number is fewer per year than the number of babies killed every day through abortion.

And the Catholic Church opposes the death penalty under most circumstance - but does acknowledge that that opposition is not absolute.

As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

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 are 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 non-existent."

Note that the Church teaches in situations in which the only way to protect human lives against an unjust aggressor is execution, the death penalty is permitted, but under most circumstances in places like the United States, where the violent can be contained or controlled (such as in prisons), the death penalty is not a necessity.

So the Church - and many pro-lifers - oppose the death penalty under most circumstances.

I am among those pro-lifers - and that's in spite of the fact that my brother was murdered. I have spoken out against the death penalty for decades. We currently do not need it in the U.S.

One can point out the truth on the other issues as well.

Being truly pro-life involves respect for all lives.

Pax et bonum