2266 The efforts of the state to curb the spread of behavior harmful to people's rights and to the basic rules of civil society correspond to the requirement of safeguarding the common good.Legitimate public authority has the right and duty to inflict punishment proportionate to the gravity of the offense. Punishment has the primary aim of redressing the disorder introduced by the offense. When it is willingly accepted by the guilty party, it assumes the value of expiation. Punishment then, in addition to defending public order and protecting people's safety, has a medicinal purpose: as far as possible, it must contribute to the correction of the guilty party.
2267 Assuming that the guilty party's identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.
What I find particularly inappropriate on the part of the Holy Father is this statement:
“All Christians and people of goodwill are called today to fight not only for the abolition of the death penalty be it legal or illegal, in all of its forms, but also for the improvement of prison conditions in the respect of the human dignity of those who have been deprived of freedom. I link this to the death sentence. In the Penal Code of the Vatican, the sanction of life sentence is no more. A life sentence is a death sentence which is concealed”.
I will quote a few of the names of the most heinous serial killers in Canada and the United States.
Paul Bernardo
Clifford Olson
Robert Pickton
Ted Bundy
John Wayne Gasey
Kermit Gosnell
Richard Ramirez
Charles Manson
Albert DeSalvo
Holy Father, with all respect we hear a lot about justice and mercy. Where is justice and where is mercy for the families of their victims which will until they die, live a life sentence?
With all respect, Holy Father, you have the right to an opinion but to teach this, is another matter. Are you planning a rewriting of the Catechism of the Catholic Church?
Life in prison is like Hell. Those there put themselves in it.