13^th August 2009

Pro-life? Oppose the death penalty

Every killing of an innocent community member increases public fervour for the death penalty. The so-called terrorists who attacked and killed hotel guests in the Indian city of Mumbai in the last week of November provide a probable example, while the now-dead plotters of Indonesia’s Bali bombings provide a certain one. I say ‘so-called terrorists’ because to call murderers ‘terrorists’ accords their actions a moral status they do not deserve. The word ‘terrorists’ implies some beef – an argument with the world and the way it’s run – which supposedly justifies extreme actions. But we should not mince words like this. Murder is murder, and rightly abhorred as the greatest sin. The reason is not hard to understand, but does imply a value judgment. The relevant judgment is that human life is uniquely important – indeed, sacred, as the courts still say when passing sentence – and to take life away is unforgivable.

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