Sister Helen Prejean Death Penalty Summary

Sister Helen Prejean was born on April 21, 1939 in Louisiana and author of “Executions Are Too Costly Morally”. She is a member of Order of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Medaille at the age 18 and supports the Abolishment of Death Penalty. She became internationally famous with her book Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty in the United States, the book was based on her own experiences of counseling and advising prisoners on death row in Louisiana prisons. She is also the founder of Survive, which is a victim’s advocacy group in New Orleans.

Sister Helen Prejean purposes of writing this text is to create awareness about the cruel and moral of death penalty and the reality of the humanness of executing a human being in the form of Capital Punishment. The audiences of this text are from college students to older age group. Because of the text used mature language and requires a deep understanding of human rights and death penalty in order to view her point of views. She wants to expresses her thought about the morality of killing a human that were allowed by our society and government. She makes the audience think about death row inmate as a person and give you the truth about what is actually taking place within our society today. She allows us go deeper into her thought to see why and how she views the death penalty as immoral and she tries to helping the poor that struggle in the justice in our

society today by giving out her argument throughout the text and stays strong to her believe that death penalty should be against.
There are many factors surround the text but government is one of the factors that have the most influence in her text is the relationship of choosing to kill people who are already in prison that our government and society are doing today. Speaking of the death penalty, government always has two-sided argument. Some believe that if you have taken life of someone else on purpose, then government has the right to take your life away. Others believe that the government should be permitted to kill. Sister Helen Prejean shows the reason why the death penalty is against human dignity a person’s rendered defenseless and taken out and killed. Dignity is not just about innocent life and what’s called the pro-life issues, it’s even for people who are guilty and have crimes because everybody is worth more than the worst crime and he or she has done in their life and so it’s about that human dignity. In 1993, the text was written with compassionate and outraged tone. She compassionate in her arguments to explains and helps the poor and prisoners who are struggle with death penalty and she believes that God creates everyone and everyone deserves to receive love and deserves to live as they willing to. The tone is outraged because Sister Helen Prejean is fighting hard for her believes in abolish the death penalty. She wants to transfer her message in every sentence. Executions are too costly is a memoir and current affairs. The text is mostly about her personal point of view and memories but she doesn’t keep it personal, she shares her thinking as you are in the same situation with her.
Sister Helen Prejean stated a strong argument at the very first sentences in first paragraph about her believes and how she feels it is an unjust capital punishment “I think of the running debate I engage in with “church” people about the death penalty” (701).

She tries to debate her subject and brings a sense to help her credibility as an authority by saying Jesus is not support death punishment. As times has indeed changed, “The “wicked” might be “coerced by the sword” to “protect the innocent,”…even punishment by death” states by

Augustine.
Helen Prejean discusses her hope by using example of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Those are who using nonviolence to solve their problem. “ Nonviolent resistance proved to be the most powerful attack imaginable on the powers King and Gandhi were trying to over turn.” (704) Sister Helen Prejean always believed that if we continue using “an eye for an eye” as a punishment, which is if you do something bad, they something bad will happen to you as a return, if you kill someone and you should be kill by someone else. She believes that Gandhi doesn’t want to take an eye to prevent, based on that there should not be a death penalty. She doesn’t believe in government action of killing someone who have committed murder, this action is totally wrong and doesn’t make any sense to her. The argument of this text was written as a counter point to an off-cited reason for the death penalty. Sister Helen Prejean proves her argument really well by pointing out why and how Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr .Both Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. give sister Helen reason believes that what she supports is right, every human life is valuable and no one can take anyone else life away, everyone is take responsibility for their own human life. Gandhi and Martin Luther King are successful in their purpose, non-violence change them for the better life, a life that not “eye for an eye” a life which death penalty is not exist. Non-violent prevent them form dying with hatred. She pushes audience to the point of showing that if you are a powerful government or you are doing law doesn’t mean you have the right to kill. As you killing the murder, that is just make you a murder no matter who doing the killing. One last argument that Helen gives out is the life in prison is costly to our society as well as the author using logos method in this argument. The cost of housing, security, court, lawyer, clothing, etc that a prisoner takes a toll on our country’s economy. “We must persuade the American people that government killings are too costly for us, not only financially, but more important morally”. After explains why non violent can be a form of social change Helen Prejean states her argument by using a different reason why we should against death penalty that capital punishment will be abolished only when the American people turn against it. Because in this country, citizens are the one who can take an action of the government, therefore we must take a serious look at the matter. As the “Executions are too costly” we would consider that amount of money into child care, food subsides, Medicare, low-income, employment training instead of funding enormous amounts toward building a new prisons. Not just because of the financial cost of each execution but also a more substantial moral argument: killing that done by government is wrong. It always a moral cost that will lies at the heart of her assessment.
After reading this text, I realize that I was extremely uninformed and guilty of not questioning my own morality in a long time ago, I lived in a society that death penalty still exist, the morality of government and society, when taking a human life into the form of Capital Punishment. I agree with her point of view that I am against the death penalty in America. As a human, there’s a spiritual energy that’s inside us, therefore a lot of people now are working for human rights. Human rights give us a road that everyone can walk, that every human being cannot be taken. People shouldn’t be tortured and killed. Even though, not all of her arguments were convincing, she effectively argues against the death penalty.
The author also using pathos as a way to convince her audiences. She starts her argument by relating her experiments and emotion of a death row inmate. She paves the way to her central idea of the death penalty is immoral and unjust, therefore it should be abolished.