As we honor Respect Life month, it is helpful to reflect on capital punishment as a life issue. There are many solid reasons why the death penalty as it is currently practiced is flawed justice. Reports clearly show that the death penalty is disproportionately given as a sentence to minority offenders, particularly to people of color. Also consider that 160 people sentenced to death since 1973 were later exonerated through additional evidence particularly through the advanced use of DNA. More recently the drugs traditionally used for lethal injection executions have become largely unavailable, and problems with alternative drugs have caused botched executions. Studies have shown that while it is suggested that the death penalty is a deterrent to violent crime, in places where the death penalty is used, such crimes actually increase. As Catholics though, even if the above challenges with the death penalty were non-existent, there remains a significant reason as to why the death penalty remains problematic based upon the Church’s teaching on the sanctity of human life. God is the author of all life, and God alone has the right to grant life or to withdraw life. No human has the authority to determine when another’s life should be ended. Life is sacred and to be respected from the womb to the tomb, period. Both St. John Paul II and Pope Francis have consistently taught that there is no need for capital punishment in our modern world where incarceration can sufficiently protect the public from such serious criminals. In August 2018, paragraph 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church was revised to read as follows: 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”. Sr. Helen Prejean author of the book, Dead Man Walking which later was made into a movie, has worked extensively with death row inmates. Another recent book, turned movie Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson highlights the problem of racial bias in applying the death penalty. Perhaps during this Respect Life Month we might take the time to learn more about capital punishment, the Church’s teaching regarding it, and maybe even about some stories of life on death row through the writings of Sr. Helen and Bryan Stevenson.