wfn.org | [UCC NEWS] UCC lauds end of juvenile executions

[guessb@ucc.org]

United Church of Christ
United Church News
The Rev. J. Bennett Guess, News Director
216-736-2177
<guessb@ucc.org>
<http://www.ucc.org>

The Rev. Sala W.J. Gonzales Nolan
Minister for Criminal Justice and Human Rights
United Church of Christ's Justice and Witness Ministries
217-736-3716
<nolans@ucc.org>

For immediate release
March 1, 2005

United Church of Christ lauds end of juvenile executions

The United Church of Christ's Justice and Witness Ministries is celebrating
today's (March 1) decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to abolish the death
penalty for juveniles.

By a narrow 5-4 decision, the high court ruled it unconstitutional for
courts to impose capital punishment on those who were juveniles at the
time
they committed their crimes. As many as 70 death row inmates are expected
to be affected by the decision, news reports indicate.

The decision was hailed immediately by many faith groups -- including the
UCC, which has long opposed capital punishment as immoral and inhumane.
Since 1969, the UCC's General Synod has adopted multiple resolutions
pointing out the gross injustices and racial inequalities associated with
the death penalty, calling for its abolishment. In 1999, the church's
national representative body ? which speaks "to" but not "for" UCC
congregations ? called for a moratorium on executions, and in 2001, the
General Synod affirmed the right of juveniles to an "equitable system of
justice."

The Rev. Sala W.J. Gonzales Nolan, the UCC's minister for criminal justice
and human rights, said Supreme Court's action is further evidence that
the
United States is coming to a new understanding about the immorality of
state-sanctioned executions. The United States remains one of the last
industrialized countries in the world to impose the death penalty.

"It is one thing to oppose the death penalty because it is unfair," Nolan
said. "It is another to oppose it simply because it is wrong."

"Again and again, the United Church of Christ has called out the
disproportionate number of black, Hispanic, poor and disabled people who
occupy death row," she said. " ? but this has nothing to do with why the
death penalty is wrong. To take someone's life deprives that person
absolutely of the ability to transcend, as we were all meant to do. This is
why vengeance does not belong to us."

With 1.3-million members in nearly 6,000 congregations, the UCC was formed
in 1957 with the union of the Congregational Christian Churches and the
Evangelical and Reformed Church. The UCC's national offices are located in
Cleveland, Ohio.

###