Being Pro-Life

I am pro-life! Does this shock anyone? No? I have developed my pro-life"ness" over many years. I even tried to start a pro-life group at my Catholic high school, but that is a whole other blog post....

Focus, Sarah, this post is about BEING pro-life. I'm not simply anti-abortion, I'm anti-killing, anti-war, anti-taking someone else's life away. Only God has the say in who dies. 

Did you know that there is a difference between being pro-life and anti-abortion? Not many people do and the 2 groups often get clumped together. Often like pro-abortion and pro-choice do. I want to elaborate more on this, but not here...

What made me want to write this post is another death sentence getting carried out.

9!!! people this year, just in the state of Missouri, have been executed!!! I have read these stories and cried a little and prayed for these people and their families. Why is it okay for the state to kill people???

Is what they, the criminal, did wrong? Yes, but is it right to kill them back? Can people change? 

Do you know what the catechism says? 

Well, since you asked:

2258 "Human life is sacred because from its beginning it involves the creative action of God and it remains for ever in a special relationship with the Creator, who is its sole end. God alone is the Lord of life from its beginning until its end: no one can under any circumstance claim for himself the right directly to destroy an innocent human being."⁵⁶

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.

So, the death penalty isn't against church teachings, but read on...

If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people's safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.

Can we keep the person detained? I think that our prison systems are pretty good. I can't remember the last time we had a high security prison break.

Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity "are very rare, if not practically nonexistent."⁶⁸

Fun Fact: it's more expensive to sentence a person to death than to sentence them to life in prison. 

Yes, I'm anti-abortion, but, by being pro-life, I'm so much more. The death penalty needs the death penalty...lol...see what I did there...anyway...

Will you join me in prayer at 12:01am for the soul of this man and the person given the job of giving the lethal injection?

UPDATE:

Shortly after posting this and spending a few moments in prayer, I read this on Facebook:

Wow! God does hear prayers!

Update #2: I shared the Facebook post above and asked friends to pray with me for this man, his family, and the person who would kill him. The response from my friends saddens me. They think it'd okay to kill him because he killed first. I will simply pray for these friends, that God shows them that ANY kind of killing is wrong.

DISCLAIMER: I do not know this man, nor the crimes he committed. I am simply against killing people.