Capital Punishment & Scripture--Genesis 9:6

Day 1

I’m a Hang ‘Em High kind of guy.

That puts me sideways with the Catholic faith and Catechism and probably with the rest of Christendom too.

Maybe that's a compelling enough reason to want to explore Scripture related to capital punishment to see if I have a Christian leg to stand on for my very worldly feelings about executing others found by the state not worthy to live.

I don’t even know if that’s the right framing for this exploration either.

Am I looking for Scriptural evidence to support my own particular sense of justice or am I looking to update ANOTHER part of my sinful nature?

Two weeks of Hosea’s anger with his unfaithful wife (and allegorically, God’s anger at Israel), just about did me in. I realized how much I have to grow to reach Hosea’s level of offering Gomer redemption because right now, as emotionally stunted as I am, I would divorce Gomer and send her and her promiscuity far from me rather than accept her back into my arms.

Maybe I should spend more time praying to God about ways to help others than wasting time on a Scriptural pursuit that seems very self-serving and insular.

Maybe.

This all started, innocently really, about a week ago when I pulled The Catholic Miscellany (the magazine of the Catholic Diocese of Charleston) from my mailbox and was flipping through it on the elevator.

I happened to land on Capital Punishment: How Can We Call This Justice? by Brian Hansen, a parishioner of Our Lady of the Rosary Church in Greenville, SC.

Already, my teeth were set on edge.

Besides, Greenville has a hippy, progressive, liberal presentation that’s hard to ignore even if most everyone still voted for Trump in 2024 (well, statistically 58%).

So, my own prejudices were already working in overdrive to sink Hansen’s opinion piece.

Hansen quotes Catholic Catechism 2267 in his defense of NOT executing the loathsome Brad Sigmon (who was executed by firing squad here in SC earlier in March):

"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."

Hmmm. That “today” qualifier is interesting to me and symbolizes the whole general direction that the dearly departed Pope Francis brought to the Catholic ministry during his time.

Hansen concludes:

“The Catholic Church emphasizes mercy and forgiveness over retribution, in alignment with Christ’s teachings. The risk of wrongful executions also undermines the moral justification for capital punishment. Each of South Carolina’s execution methods falls short of Catholic Christian principles. Whether through the electric chair’s violent destruction of the body, prolonged suffering caused by lethal injection, or the brutal spectacle of the firing squad, a fundamental issue remains — capital punishment contradicts the Church’s call to uphold the sanctity of life.”

Yeah, but…I’m not buying the purposeful emotional language here–the ”electric chair’s violent destruction of the body,” the “prolonged suffering caused by lethal injection,” or “the brutal spectacle of the firing squad.”

Brad Sigmon bludgeoned to death the parents of his ex-girlfriend with a baseball bat before he kidnapped her at gunpoint–going between two rooms and beating each of their heads into a bloody pulp.

How’s that for emotional language?

Sigmon found Jesus in prison and his last words before being executed by firing squad were:

“I want my closing statement to be one of love and a calling to my fellow Christians to help us end the death penalty. An eye for an eye was used as justification to the jury for seeking the death penalty. At that time, I was too ignorant to know how wrong that was.”

I find his words to be self-serving malarkey without a whit of regret for beating two people to death with a baseball bat.

And Hansen fell for it.

So if there is an increasing “awareness”, TODAY, according to the new and improved Catholic Church, that the death penalty is out of bounds, what about YESTERDAY?

What about Genesis 9:6?

Genesis 9:6 Whoever sheds human blood, By man his blood shall be shed, For in the image of God He made mankind.

In Capital Punishment and The Bible, Gardner Hanks explains the context of verse 6:

“[Verse 6] simply describes the likely consequences of murder. If a person kills another, the victim’s family will seek revenge, and the murderer is likely to be murdered in retaliation. The passage speaks of a single person as the avenger. Hence, it describes the role of the “avenger of blood,” a murder victim’s close kinsman who carries responsibility for avenging the killing. In this sense, the passage is merely descriptive of the actual situation, not necessarily prescriptive of what should happen.”

So, YESTERDAY, honor killing was expected, if not encouraged.

Hanks continues:

“This passage places a limit on the blood feud. In limiting the responsibility for vengeance to the “avenger of blood”, it restricts other members of the family from seeking vengeance. It thereby reduces the possibility of a widening circle of violence. It also limits revenge to the murderer himself, not to other members of his family…Thus the passage is a prohibition of substitutionary killing, in which one person is killed for the crime of another.”

I find the last part of verse 6 to be interesting as well–we are created in the image of God–so when someone kills another, they are killing someone MADE LIKE GOD.

We are differentiated from the animals because of qualities like our self-worth, reason, creativity, and morality.

We are interacting with other people who are made like God and who,if they are saved by His grace, will live eternally.

If one of those reasonable, creative, brimming with self-worth kinds of people takes the life of someone I love–am I to turn the other cheek?

Genesis 9:6 would suggest not–especially since honor killing seems so YESTERDAY.

So far, I’m not all that persuaded that capital punishment contradicts the church’s call to uphold the sanctity of life, but more accurately upholds Genesis 9:6–especially for those unable to conduct an honor killing on their own.

I’m still a Hang “Em High guy–but I’m going to pray differently and see what happens. 🙂

Lord, where blood has been shed, heal the wounds of victims and their families. Help us to honor the dignity of every person, even those who have sinned gravely, remembering that they hold Your image.

Lord, inspire our hearts to seek restoration and pray that feelings of vengeance gives way to mercy.

Amen.