Baptist ethicist and theologian Dr. Roger E. Olson (pictured) recently issued a call “for Christian churches to publicly stand against the death penalty for Christian reasons.” A professor of Christian Theology and Ethics at Baylor University’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary, Dr. Olson writes in an essay for the theology website Patheos.com that “authentic Christians must oppose the death penalty.” He says that, while “[t]here are many secular reasons to abolish the death penalty,” there are also theological reasons why church opposition to capital punishment should be non-negotiable. “Christians believe that every individual human being might be someone chosen by God for his salvation and for his service,” he writes. “When we take another human life unnecessarily, we usurp God’s prerogative for that person’s eventual salvation or, if they are already saved, for that person’s future service for the Kingdom of God.” Dr. Olson’s essay urges all Christian churches to take public stands against the death penalty. “I believe the Christian reasons for opposing the death penalty are so strong that capital punishment ought to be, as slavery was in the mid-19th century, an issue for a ‘church struggle’ that divides if sadly necessary. At the very least, Christian pastors and other leaders ought to preach against capital punishment from their pulpits and in their newsletters.”
(B. Allen, “Is opposition to death penalty a non-negotiable for Christians? Yes, says one theologian,” Baptist News Global, March 8, 2016; R. Olson, “Why Authentic Christians Must Oppose the Death Penalty,” Patheos.com, March 7, 2016.) See Religion.
New Voices
Mar 21, 2024
