US Catholics look to St. Maximilian Kolbe in efforts to abolish death penalty

As the Catholic Church marks the feast of St. Maximilian Kolbe, the Executive Director of the Catholic Mobilizing Network shares her hopes for the future abolition of the death penalty in the United States.

By Vatican News

August 14 marks the liturgical feast of St. Maximilian Kolbe, who gave his life in 1941 in the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz to save the life of a young father.

Now patron saint of the pro-life movement, the Polish priest provides a guiding light to Catholics who seek to abolish the death penalty, such as the Catholic Mobilizing Network, a nonprofit working for that goal in the United States.

In 2018, Pope Francis modified the text of the Catechism of the Catholic Church to explicitly denounce the death penalty, which now reads: “The Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that ‘the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person’.”

Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, Executive Director of Catholic Mobilizing Network, sat down with Vatican News to offer her take on the current situation of the death penalty and how public perception and laws are gradually changing.

What are some of the current realities of the death penalty landscape in the United States at this moment in 2025?

In December, the anti-death penalty movement celebrated a historic and successful campaign for federal death row commutations when then-President Joe Biden commuted the sentences of 37 of the 40 individuals who were on the federal death row.

Now, just seven months later the United States has seen a recent uptick in state-level executions.

So far this year, ten states have taken the lives of 28 individuals—an increase from the total 25 executions in the United States throughout 2024. And within just the next month alone, another four men face state-sanctioned death.

We’ve also seen states pursuing the use of capital punishment in new ways, including through new or revitalized execution methods, and in a few states, legislation to expand the way the death penalty can be applied.

You know the ins and outs of the death penalty abolition movement, beyond the headlines of execution numbers. What is important for people to know about this moment that they may not otherwise know?

In light of this uptick in executions, many have asked: What does this mean for the progress of death penalty abolition?

Many of the individuals executed this year were sentenced to death more than 20 or 30 years ago. Sometimes, they were sentenced under laws that have since been changed—like the right for a judge to override a jury—but were not applied retroactively.

In many ways, capital punishment is like the light we see from distant stars—it burns not because it’s alive and well, but because it takes time for us to see that it has already died.

This is certainly true of the U.S. system of capital punishment today.

Many of the individuals executed this year were sentenced to death more than 20 or 30 years ago. Sometimes, they were sentenced under laws that have since been changed—like the right for a judge to override a jury—but were not applied retroactively. And in several cases, juries have publicly stated that if they had seen all of the evidence available today that was not presented at trial, they would have never voted for death in the first place.

These cases are relics of the past. But when we look to the present, we realize there is so much more evidence of hope.

For example, new death sentences remain near historic lows. So far in 2025, only ten people have been sentenced to death in just six states—a 30% decrease compared to the same period last year.

Public opinion polls and analyses also demonstrate that the American population is largely falling out of favor with the practice of capital punishment. In November 2024, Gallup reported that death penalty support had dropped to just 53%—the lowest it’s been since the 1970s.

Young adults are leading this charge. 42% of Gen Z reportedly favor the death penalty compared to 62% of Baby Boomers.

Two decades ago, all of these generation groups supported the death penalty at a rate that was within just three points of the national average. As younger generations have entered into adulthood, they have broken away from this average, supporting the death penalty less and less.

What is the role of Catholics in this shift away from death penalty support?

Additional studies have explored these declines not by generational gaps, but by religious affiliations.

Positively, Catholic support for the death penalty declined more than any other religious demographic between the 1970s and 2022. The decline in Catholic support for the death penalty was even stronger for those who identified as weekly mass-goers (Associate of Religion Data Archives).

What this analysis demonstrates is that what the Church teaches truly matters, and those who are in the pews to hear the teaching reflect those beliefs in their opinions on the death penalty.

How are we, as Catholics, called to hold onto hope, despite these moments that may feel like setbacks—particularly in this Jubilee Year?

As the Executive Director of the national Catholic nonprofit working to end the death penalty in the United States, I find both resolve and hope for our continued work—even amid challenges—because of the progress I’ve seen happen, especially the progress that has been led by Catholics.

This year, we are particularly invested in finding hope in our midst as we answer the Jubilee Year’s call to be Pilgrims of Hope. But even beyond this special commemoration, we are blessed with a liturgical calendar that includes sign posts of hope all year long, each and every year.

One of those sign posts comes today (August 14), when we celebrate the feast day of our patron saint, St. Maximilian Kolbe, OFM Conv.

St. Maximilian, a Conventual Franciscan, was arrested by the German Gestapo and placed in Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp. While imprisoned there, St. Maximilian took the place of a young father who had been chosen to die in the starvation chamber.

After [two] weeks without food, St. Maximilian was the only prisoner still alive in the starvation chamber. He was executed by a lethal injection of carbolic acid.

The young father whose life St. Maximilian saved, Franciszek Gajowniczek, lived until 1995. Today, St. Maximilian is remembered as the patron saint of prisoners, families, and the pro-life movement.

RELATED | The Sacrifice of Maximilian Kolbe

I pray that St. Maximilian will continue to intercede for us in our ongoing efforts to abolish capital punishment here in the United States, and that he will bring hope to those who are weighed down by the heavy weight of state-sanctioned death.

— Pope Paul VI beatified Kolbe, calling him a confessor of the faith. Pope John Paul II canonized Kolbe as a martyr of charity. (DPN)

Source: Vatican News, Staff, August 14, 2025

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde