Editor’s note: This is part of a series of columns in which Archbishop Dolan addresses “hot button” issues.

Within me is a tension between my stomach and my soul. That’s obvious to anyone who sees me, and it is equally apparent that the appetites of my stomach for rich and plentiful food more often than not trump the prudent restraint of my soul urging moderation and diet.

But I’m talking about an even deeper tug-of-war within me between the urges of — let’s call it another name this time — my gut and my soul. So, when someone cuts-me-off on the highway, my gut wants to curse and shake my fist, while my soul whispers, let it pass … calm down….

This tension between gut and soul is also evident in my thoughts about the death penalty. I must admit, my gut, when I hear of a heinous, vicious, cold-blooded crime, wants me to volunteer to pull the switch on the electric chair, while my soul, my heart, whispers, “All life is sacred; let the killing cease; this is no way to protect ourselves; this only makes things worse.”

As usual, my heart is right, my gut is dead wrong.

The only path to a sane, healthy, safe, respectful society is to safeguard all life, from conception to natural death, from the baby in the womb to the prisoner guilty of a capital crime. That is the Culture of Life.

Even from a human, natural point of view, the death penalty is unjust. We know innocent people have been executed, a dramatic mistake recognized only later, when it’s tragically way too late. We realize that those put to death are overwhelmingly from poor, minority backgrounds, people who cannot afford expensive, talented, connected attorneys.

We acknowledge that sound data shows no evidence that execution of criminals is a deterrent to crime. No wonder most every other civilized country in the world has abolished the death penalty.

When you add to those cogent natural reasons questioning the justice of the death penalty the light of faith, the argument becomes overwhelming cogent: those of us who believe that the man executed as a criminal on the cross happened to be the Son of God have a special passion to our abhorrence of the death penalty, as we firmly believe that every human life is sacred, that a society that strangely seeks to defend life by taking it is a contributor to the culture of death, not the culture of life.

Granted, according to the teaching of the Church (c.f. Catechism of the Catholic Church, #2267), the death penalty is not “intrinsically evil.” (That means “always and everywhere wrong by its very nature”). However, the same Catechism, bolstered by the indefatigable preaching of the late John Paul II, is clear that the strict conditions that could justify the moral use of the death penalty “are very rare, if practically non-existent,” (John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae, 56), so that those means “… more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity with the dignity of the human person” are much, much more appropriate.

That means we are not softies here, that we detest violent crime, that we embrace the victims of it, and their suffering families and friends, that we call for strict penalties such as life imprisonment without release … but that we still firmly reject the death penalty as unworthy of a civilized people, as part of the problem, not the solution.

Might it be more convenient, less of a burden on society, less expensive, safer, to execute a criminal? Probably so … but that’s one of the arguments used by abortionists to justify taking the life of the pre-born baby, or by the Dr. Kevorkians of the world who want to push the needle into the arms of fragile, “useless,” dying people. This is the reasoning of the culture of death.

We watch as Palestinians and Israelis exchange missiles and ask “when will it stop?” We hear of the tragic fatal shooting of an innocent 15-year old girl on her porch in a Milwaukee neighborhood and ask, “When will this stop?”

Let’s hope we do not have to gaze upon death now here in Wisconsin as prisoners are strapped to a gurney, and ask, “When will it stop?”

Yes, I know, you’ll say, “An eye for an eye.” I’ll respond by quoting Gandhi,

“… that will end up leaving us all blind.”