The emergence of the death penalty as a central issue in the Virginia governor's race raises the question of how the Catholic faith of candidate Tim Kaine might affect his performance in office.
The short answer: That's up to Kaine.
"The church teaching is very consistently supportive of all human life, from womb to tomb," said Steve Neill, editor of the Catholic Virginian newspaper and spokesman for the Diocese of Richmond.
But people in public office make a promise to uphold the law, and that's what Kaine says he will do if elected governor. Though he has said he personally opposes the death penalty, he vows in a TV ad to carry out Virginia law, including signing death warrants.
When it comes to balancing church teachings with secular law, a Catholic officeholder has to answer to his or her own conscience, Neill said.
He noted that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, a Catholic, made a distinction between personal beliefs and settled law during his confirmation hearings.
Roberts declined to answer senators' specific questions about his views on Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion. But he said he respected the doctrine of stare decisis , which calls for courts to abide by laws and precedents. While precedents can be overturned, Roberts told senators, "It is not enough that you may think the prior decision was wrongly decided."
When Catholic public officials make decisions not in keeping with church teachings, "It doesn't make them less loyal to their church," Neill said.
Kaine, a Democrat, has come under fire from Republican Jerry Kilgore as untrustworthy on the death-penalty issue.
Kilgore has faulted Kaine for having done pro bono work on death-sentence appeals.
Kilgore commercials feature emotional family members of murder victims saying they don't believe Kaine would execute their loved ones' killers.
Another Kilgore ad claimed that Kaine's views are so extreme he wouldn't even consider Adolph Hitler as deserving execution. Kaine's people responded by saying that bringing up Hitler's name for political gain shows a dearth of ethics on the Kilgore side.
Catholic opposition to the death penalty has long been a part of the catechism and was reinforced by the late Pope John Paul II.
In a 1995 encyclical, John Paul II wrote that execution should be used only "in cases of absolute necessity" or "when it would not be possible to otherwise defend society." The pope continued, "Today, however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically nonexistent."
In simple terms, "The church says the death penalty would not be justified if there are nonlethal ways" of protecting society, said Executive Director Jeff Caruso of the Virginia Catholic Conference, the public policy representative of Virginia's bishops.
Those bishops, Arlington's Paul S. Loverde and Richmond's Francis X. DiLorenzo, have argued that Virginia's sentence of life without parole should be used instead of the death penalty.
This summer, they jointly sent a letter asking Gov. Mark Warner to commute the death sentence of Robin Lovitt, convicted of the 1998 scissors killing of an Arlington pool hall manager. Lovitt's execution has been set for Nov. 30.
In the Lovitt case, physical evidence was destroyed before all appeals were exhausted, eliminating the opportunity for retesting to prevent error.
But the bishops argued that the death penalty would be unnecessary "even if we could be absolutely certain of Mr. Lovitt's guilt" because they said Lovitt's execution is not necessary to protect society.
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