Catholics and Capital PunishmentCatholic opponents of the death penalty sometimes seem to lose sight of the primary purpose of punishment. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says: "Punishment has the primary purpose of recomposing the disorder introduced by the offense." If I commit a serious offense against society, I cause disorder, and the purpose of punishment is to restore the lost order. If I willingly accept my punishment, "it takes on the value of expiation." And it can protect you from future crimes I might commit. The Catechism thus identifies three purposes of punishment: the defense of public order, the protection of people and the moral change of the criminal. Paragraph 2267 recalls that "the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude the use of the death penalty", but then adds: "if this is the only possible way to effectively defend human lives from the unjust aggressor". This appears to cause the secondary purpose of punishment to prevail over the primary purpose. This appearance has led to some confusing reflections. The correct meaning must be that the primary purpose of punishment can be achieved without imposing the death penalty. A single means – for example life imprisonment – ​​restores the order lost due to the crime, protects society from future crimes of prisoners and gives the prisoner the opportunity to repent. The paragraph should not be read as meaning that the protection of society trumps all else. . Why? Because imprisonment protects society from future possible crimes. But the criminal cannot be punished for what he might do; he's in prison because of what he's already done. If life imprisonment is to serve the primary purpose of punishment, it must, like the death penalty, be justified primarily as sufficiently "redressing the disorder introduced by the crime." Section 2267 addresses only a secondary purpose of punishment: protecting society. Unless, as suggested, “protecting society” is interpreted as also “repairing the mess”. (Paragraph 2266 distinguishes “defense of public order” from “protection of the safety of persons”). Sometimes, in the clamor for the abolition of the death penalty, we hear that punishment is no longer the purpose of punishment. But if there is no reason for punishment, the punishment is unjust: all that excuses is the fear that someone might harm us in the future and that solitude might improve his soul. The enthusiasm sometimes obscures the fact that the Catechism "does not exclude recourse to the death penalty." However rare such recourse may be, even if it were only once in a millennium, it should be justified.