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Death penalty and euthanasia

The Catholic Church is committed to the worldwide abolition of the death penalty in any circumstance. The current Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that "in the light of the Gospel " the death penalty is "inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person " and that the Catholic Church "works with determination for its abolition worldwide." In his 2020 encyclical Fratelli tutti, Francis repeated that the death penalty is "inadmissible" and that "there can be no stepping back from this position". On 9 January 2022, Pope Francis stated in his annual speech to Vatican ambassadors: "The death penalty cannot be employed for a purported state justice, since it does not constitute a deterrent nor render justice to victims, but only fuels the thirst for vengeance".

There is controversy about whether the Catholic Church considers the death penalty intrinsically evil. American Archbishop José Horacio Gómez and Catholic philosopher Edward Feser argue that this is a matter of prudential judgement and that the church does not teach this as a de fide statement; others, such as Cardinals Charles Maung Bo and Rino Fisichella, state that it does.

The Catholic Church opposes active euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide on the grounds that life is a gift from God and should not be prematurely shortened. However, the church allows dying people to refuse extraordinary treatments that would minimally prolong life without hope of recovery.