After Pope Francis approved an update to the Catechism of the Catholic Church on the death penalty, CTS has published the first English-language edition to include this crucial update. It is currently available in the paperback edition only.
What does the updated text on capital punishment say and why was it updated?
In 2018, Pope Francis approved a new draft on the paragraph of the Catechism of the Catholic Church which explained Church teaching on the death penalty.
The updated wording spoke of “an increasing awareness that the dignity of the person is not lost even after the commission of very serious crimes.” It also acknowledged that “more effective systems of detention have been developed” which ensure that not only “the due protection of citizens, but at the same time, do not definitively deprive the guilty of the possibility of redemption.”
This means that the death penalty is considered by the Catholic Church to be “inadmissible”, recognising it as “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person”. For this reason, the Church “works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”
You can read the paragraph in full here.
These changes can now be found for the first time in an English language edition of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Our newly updated and reprinted Catechism of the Catholic Church (Paperback Edition) is available now.
For Further Reading:
Fidei Depositum: On the Publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church
The CTS edition of the Catechism of the Catholic Church is an invaluable resource for anyone, anywhere, who wants to explore and understand the richness and breadth of Catholic belief. Paperback edition.
