Poll: Younger Christians less supportive of the death penalty

[hrmjustin]

Jonathan Merritt

(RNS) One day after the state of Ohio executed a man for murder (Jan. 16), a new poll shows younger Christians are not as supportive of the death penalty as older members of their faith.

When asked if they agreed that “the government should have the option to execute the worst criminals,” 42 percent of self-identified Christian boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, said “yes.” Only 32 percent of self-identified Christian millennials, born between 1980 and 2000, said the same thing.

The poll conducted by Barna Group this past summer and released to Religion News Service Friday, surveyed 1,000 American adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.6 percentage points.

It showed an even sharper difference in support for the death penalty among “practicing Christians,” which Barna defined as those who say faith is very important to their lives and have attended church at least once in the last month. Nearly half of practicing Christian boomers support the government’s right to execute the worst criminals, while only 23 percent of practicing Christian millennials

http://www.religionnews.com/2014/01/17/among-us-christians-declining-support-death-penalty/

[kentauros]

1. This is good news!

And I suspect those numbers will drop even more as states begin to resort to firing squads for executions. (The "lethal injection" chemicals are scarce right now.)

I am curious what the percentages were for all other faiths, if it was part of the survey.

[hrmjustin]

2. It looks like they asked Christians only but I would imagine there would be a similar trend.

[kentauros]

3. I don't know other religions well enough to make a guess,

so I can only hope it's the same with the rest. Most love peace, despite the extreme factions, so I would hope that means being non-violent even with regards to the actions of the state.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

4. Here is the current Catholic view on the subject

From Pope John Paul II's encyclical, Evangelium Vitae -- "The Gospel of Life", section 56. After a discussion of self defense, he says

This is the context in which to place the problem of the death penalty. On this matter there is a growing tendency, both in the Church and in civil society, to demand that it be applied in a very limited way or even that it be abolished completely. The problem must be viewed in the context of a system of penal justice ever more in line with human dignity and thus, in the end, with God's plan for man and society. The primary purpose of the punishment which society inflicts is "to redress the disorder caused by the offence." Public authority must redress the violation of personal and social rights by imposing on the offender an adequate punishment for the crime, as a condition for the offender to regain the exercise of his or her freedom. In this way authority also fulfills the purpose of defending public order and ensuring people's safety, while at the same time offering the offender an incentive and help to change his or her behaviour and be rehabilitated.

It is clear that, for these purposes to be achieved, the nature and extent of the punishment must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity: in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.

In any event, the principle set forth in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church remains valid: 'If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.'

To sum this up, capital punishment is not intrinsically immoral, but there are essentially no situations in which it is morally acceptable.