The Lord GOD has
given me a well-trained tongue, That I might know how to speak to the
weary a word that will rouse them. Morning after morning he opens my ear that I
may hear; And I have not rebelled, have not turned back. Isaiah 50:4-5
One of the Twelve,
who was called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What
are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?” They paid him thirty
pieces of silver, and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand
him over. Matthew
26:14-16
Piety
Lord,
give me the attitude of your faithful disciple Isaiah. Open my ears to hear your Word. Then, open my mouth that I may faithfully
proclaim it. However, make sure that I
do not stop there. Open my heart so that
I may faithfully follow Your Word without turning back in my humble works.
Study
What
are we supposed to do?
That
is the question which has been directed to us time after time throughout the
Lenten season. Like in today’s servant
song from Isaiah, we are pointed to example after loving example of ways to
serve God and the people of the Kingdom by putting others ahead of ourselves.
In essence, we should answer this question like the popular bracelets – “WWJD?”
What would Jesus do is the perspective that should guide our choices.
But
choices abound. As we reach the
threshold of the Triduum, Judas provides to us the example of what NOT to
do. Betrayal is shown as the opposite of
service.
Action
As
Lenten and Holy Week practices go, perhaps none are as powerful as the contrast
between what will happen in churches Thursday and Friday. Thursday, we will focus on the servant Jesus
washing the feet of his disciples.
Friday, we will focus on the feet of Jesus moving from trial to torture
to state-sponsored death by execution – step-by-bloody-painful-step up
Calvary.
As
Pope Francis takes those steps Friday, his Good Friday reflections also will
ask us to reflect upon when the death penalty will be abolished.
At the station that marks Jesus being nailed
to the cross, Francis and the pilgrims will use a reflection that questions
modern-day uses of both the death penalty and torture.
“We gaze at you, Jesus, as you are nailed to
the cross,” states the
reflection. “And our conscience is troubled.”
“We anxiously ask: When will the death
penalty, still practiced in many states, be abolished?” it continues. “When
will every form of torture and the violent killing of innocent persons come to
an end? Your Gospel is the surest defense of the human person, of every human
being.”
Does
our “legal” practice emulate more the servant attitude of Christ or is it a
betrayal of the Gospel defense of love in action? Does this trouble your
conscience? Living in Virginia, one of
the top states to use execution (even when consecutive Catholic men occupied the
Governor’s mansion), we can use this season and the example of our pope to ask
our political leaders to turn away from the use of such force.
While Catholic
teaching holds that the death penalty can be used in a situation where the
public authority can find no other way to contain a dangerous person, the last
several popes have said that such situations likely no longer exist.
Francis has been even more publically opposed
to the practice, saying
March 20 that "today the death penalty is inadmissible, no matter how
serious the crime committed.”
Francis
added that executing a prisoner can no longer be justified by a society's need
to defend itself, and he addressed two issues prominent in the American
context: He declared that the death penalty "loses all legitimacy"
because of the possibility of judicial error, and he said "there is no
humane way of killing another person."
Several
recent botched executions have given anti-death-penalty advocates more
ammunition for their arguments. More and
more states are now having trouble finding the drugs that have been used for
decades to administer lethal injection.
One state has gone so far as to reauthorize use of the firing squad if the
pharmaceutical cocktail cannot be found to bring on death.
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