The Death Penalty is an act of despair.

~ We admit a sense of lost hope for the criminal we condemn to death.

~ We despair of the very rehabilitative ends we use to justify our action.

~ When we surrender to hopelessness, it's not only the criminal's ability to change and make retribution for his crime that we reject, but we reject the very action of grace in the life of the condemned.

And that should be very troubling to us...