Improved penal systems offer real security.

~ We are able to secure society through improved, maximum security prisons.

The Catachism of the Catholic Church was rewritten in 1997 to emphasize this teaching:

"If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they correspond to the concrete conditions of the Common Good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person." [2265-2267]

"The Death penalty is only appropriate in cases of absolute necessity, in other words, when it could not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today, however, as a result of steady improvement in the organization of the penal system, such cases are rare, if not practically non-existent."

Pope John Paul II
Evangelium Vitae