Should Christians Support the Death Penalty?
I’ll begin with a press cutting about the Taliban. Please let me disclaim that I believe that the vast majority of Muslims seek peace, probably more so than Western people, and that the Taliban are not representative of Muslims in Afghanistan or anywhere else.
8 January, 2001, Project Open Book
KABUL, Afghanistan, (AP) – Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers on Monday imposed the death penalty for anyone who converts from Islam to another religion. Any non-Muslim found trying to win converts will also be killed, Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar said on Taliban-run Radio Shariat. Omar accused followers of other faiths – particularly Christians and Jews – of trying to convert Muslims and seeking to demonise the harsh brand of Islam practiced by the Taliban.
Recent events like the horrific killing of two schoolgirls in Cambridgeshire have prompted some people to argue for the death penalty. However, it clearly states in the bible:
“You shall not kill.”
Exodus 20:13 (AV)
Often supporters of the death penalty argue that to execute someone is not to kill them. They argue that maybe ‘kill’ means one individual murdering another, but if many people get together to execute someone it is not killing them but something else.
In the Holocaust, the government executed over five million Jews. The executors saw the Jews as not humans, as some kind of lesser species that was okay to exterminate. I am sure you can think of many other mass killings of people. A constant theme is that the executors do not see the victims as men and women made in the image of God, but as sub-humans or animals.
Those who argue for the death penalty argue that some people are not able to be reformed, not able to take their place in society. However, as Christians we believe not only that every single human is made in the image of God but also through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, God is powerful enough to transform everyone including serial murderers like the apostle Paul, who said:
Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
2 Corinthians 5:17 (WEB)
…be transformed by the renewing of your mind…
Romans 12:2b(i) (AV)
To execute someone is to argue there is no possibility for someone to be changed, that God is not powerful enough to do it. A not very powerful God might be acceptable to some people but I only have faith for an all-powerful God, otherwise we all might as well go home.
Let us not forget the woman caught in adultery (recorded in John 8:1-11). The Pharisees were quick to point out that the Old Testament law demanded the death penalty. What they didn’t realise is that Jesus had the authority to forgive sins. Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more”.
Some argue that to give justice to victims, criminals must be executed; personally I cannot so easily brush away the words of Jesus who said:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you, don’t resist him who is evil; but whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also. If anyone sues you to take away your coat, let him have your cloak also.”
Matthew 5:38-39 (WEB)
Revenge can never be a Christian justification for a policy. Also why the death penalty for murder but not for adultery? In the Old Testament times it was the death penalty for both because all sins are equal to God, no matter how large or small. Therefore supporters of the death penalty must accept the death penalty for speeding or for not paying the TV license. Paul argued:
For all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious standard.
Romans 3:23 (NLT)
All western European Countries have abolished the death penalty. I believe that all Christians who are serious about following Christ should be against the death penalty, even American ones. Executions are common in China, Iraq, India, Iran, Pakistan, the Palestinian Authority territories, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria.
However, in the last few months Chile and Yugoslavia have abolished the death penalty. Turkey is in the last stages in the process of abolishing the death penalty. More than 660 people have been executed in the US since the death penalty was reintroduced in 1976 (Figure from The Guardian, Tuesday December 19, 2000). On 20 June 2002, the Supreme Court abolished executed the mentally retarded, so there is hope for further change in America. As it says on the dollar, “In God we trust”.
In July 1983 the Church of England General Synod debated capital punishment and the following motion was carried: ‘That this Synod would deplore the reintroduction of capital punishment into the United Kingdom sentencing policy.’
The World Methodist Council President Frances Alguire, and the Archbishop of Canterbury and many other Christian leaders from across the denominations and four million other people (including the Dalai Lama and lots of random Hollywood celebrates), signed a petition calling for an end to the death penalty handed to the UN in December 2000.
Kofi Annan, secretary general of the UN, who received the petition, said he shared the campaigners’ hope for a global ban on the death penalty. He said: “What happens when you discover that it is a mistake? Recently we have seen many who have been found not guilty as a result of DNA and other new evidence.” (Quote from IC News)
I will leave you with a prayer and a more complex thought for those who are theologically inclined. I didn’t write this prayer (its quite old) but I have prayed using it, if you want to then you can pray with me that the death penalty would be abolished in every country, helping another aspect of God’s kingdom to come on earth. After all, in the new heaven and earth there will be no death penalty, and we can all agree on that.
A Prayer to Abolish the Death Penalty
God of Compassion,
You let your rain fall on the just and the unjust.
Expand and deepen our hearts
so that we may love as You love,
even those among us
who have caused the greatest pain by taking life.
For there is in our land a great cry for vengeance
as we fill up death rows and kill the killers
in the name of justice, in the name of peace.
Jesus, our brother,
you suffered execution at the hands of the state
but you did not let hatred overcome you.
Help us to reach out to victims of violence
so that our enduing love may help them heal.
Holy Spirit of God,
You strengthen us in the struggle for justice.
Help us to work tirelessly
for the abolition of state-sanctioned death
and to renew our society in its very heart
so that violence will be no more. Amen.
A More Complex Thought
Gardner C. Hanks, who died just a few months ago from cancer, argued that while the Hebrew Scriptures give some support to the use of the death penalty, they also demand that people apply high standards for fairness and protecting the innocent. He argued that the use of capital punishment in the United States does not even meet the standards of the Old Testament.
Hanks argued that Jesus and the early church extended the concept of restorative justice. According to the Gospels and the epistles, God’s love, as exemplified in the life and teachings of Jesus, requires restorative rather than retributive justice. Hanks concluded that the use of the death penalty is not compatible with Jesus’ call for love and forgiveness.
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