IMAGE: CNS photo/Bob Roller
By Anne Condodina
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Abolishing the death penalty worldwide
would reflect the brave and hope-filled belief that crime can be dealt with without
capital punishment and that a criminal should be given the chance to reform, a
top Vatican diplomat told world leaders.
“Respect for the dignity of every human person and the
common good are the two pillars on which the Holy See has developed its
position” of advocating for an end to the death penalty, Archbishop Paul
R. Gallagher, Vatican foreign minister, said Sept. 25 at the United Nations in
New York, where he led the Vatican delegation at the 73rd session of the U.N.
general assembly. The Vatican released a copy of his speech Sept. 26.
Speaking at a high-level U.N. side event on the death
penalty and the role of poverty and the right to legal representation, the
archbishop said that the universal abolition would be a “courageous
reaffirmation” that humanity can successfully deal with crime while also
refusing “to succumb to despair before evil acts, offering the criminal a
chance to reform.”
The archbishop cited Pope Francis’ recent revision of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that “the death penalty is
inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the
person” and the
church “works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”
The catechism’s paragraph on capital punishment, 2267, had
been updated by St. John Paul II in 1997 to strengthen its skepticism about the
need to use the death penalty in the modern world and, particularly, to affirm
the importance of protecting all human life.
The original text recognized “the right and duty of
legitimate public authority to punish malefactors by means of penalties
commensurate with the gravity of the crime, not excluding, in cases of extreme
gravity, the death penalty.” However, as Pope Francis recently
highlighted, there have been steady improvements of the penal system, and
countries have the capability to protect the public order and safety with means
other than the death penalty.
Additionally,
the pope has warned against the possibility of judicial error and the misuse of
capital punishment in totalitarian and dictatorial regimes as a way to suppress
political opposition or to persecute religious and cultural minorities.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center based in
Washington, D.C., 56 countries still retain the death penalty for ordinary
crimes. The remainder of countries have abolished it, either in law or
practice.
China, Iran and Saudi Arabia executed the most people in
2016, according to Amnesty International figures. Amnesty says that China carries
out judicial killings in the thousands every year, reporting the country as
“the world’s top executioner.”
In 2016, the United States dropped out of the top five
executioner countries for the first time since 2006. The U.S. put 20 people to
death, which was the lowest number since 1991, according to Amnesty.
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