I want to share some good news—it looks as if we’ve reached a tipping point. Please read the following quote from Sister Helen Prejean (a member of the Congregation of Saint Joseph) that appeared in the January 21 edition of America Magazine. Sr. Helen Prejean is the author of Dead Man Walking, which is an autobiographical account of her ministry among prisoners on death row. You may recall the film and the opera that were based on her book. I’ll let Sr. Helen speak for me in my joy about the tipping point.
Now, at last, there are signs of hope. As support for the death penalty has steadily declined in the United States in recent years, Catholic support has dropped even more significantly. According to the Pew Research Center, 78 percent of Americans—and a higher proportion of Catholics, 80 percent—supported the death penalty in 1996. By 2011, however, those numbers had fallen to 62 percent and 59 percent, respectively. Now Catholics support the death penalty at a lower rate than the general population.
The tipping point to which I refer is that Catholics are less likely to support the death penalty than are members of the general population and that in 15 years that support has dropped by 21%. It’s true that 59% of Catholics still support the death penalty (according to Pew Research anyway) but the trend is what I’m celebrating here. As a pro-life community---this is truly good news.