Kristan Hawkins, head of Students for Life of America, posted on X: “For my Catholic friends on X, if you know the church’s opposition to the death penalty yet gleefully advocate for it, you are in sin.” The statement is stunning, because the Church’s teaching on capital punishment, as with all definitive teachings on faith and morals, is unchanged and unchangeable.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches that lawful slaying belongs to civil authorities, who punish the guilty and protect the innocent. The rightful use of this power, Trent says, “far from involving the crime of murder, is an act of paramount obedience” to the Fifth Commandment. That is the constant teaching of the Church. Yet in 2018, Pope Francis revised the Catechism to declare the death penalty “inadmissible.” The two statements are opposites. And no one corrected it.
Pope Francis said: “Someone who says I’m against abortion but says I’m in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life.” The cardinals who knew better remained silent. Now Hawkins and other Catholic pro-life leaders have gone down the same road, accusing those who adhere to the constant teaching of the Church of sin. The inversion is complete. Pro-life leaders are calling faithful Catholics sinners for believing what the Church has always taught. And the silence from the hierarchy continues. The question is who will correct it before the confusion claims more souls.
