The following is the text of the Pope’s video with the prayer intention for the month of September, disseminated via the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, on the theme: “Let us pray that the death penalty, which attacks the dignity of the human person, may be legally abolished in every country”:

Video of the Holy Father

Each day, there is a growing “NO” to the death penalty around the world. For the Church, this is a sign of hope.

From a legal point of view, it is not necessary.

Society can effectively repress crime without definitively depriving the offenders of the possibility of redeeming themselves.

Always, in every legal sentence, there must be a window of hope. 

Capital punishment offers no justice to victims, but rather encourages revenge. 

And it prevents any possibility of undoing a possible miscarriage of justice.

Additionally, the death penalty is morally inadmissible, for it destroys the most important gift we have received: life. Let us not forget that, up to the very last moment, a person can convert and change.

And in the light of the Gospel, the death penalty is unacceptable. The commandment, “Thou shalt not kill,” refers to both the innocent and the guilty.

I, therefore, call on all people of goodwill to mobilize for the abolition of the death penalty throughout the world.

Let us pray that the death penalty, which attacks the dignity of the human person, may be legally abolished in every country.