The death penalty is one of the great moral issues that continues to face many countries, yet most people rarely think about it and very few of us take the time to delve deeply enough into this issue. Sr. Helen Prejean is a southern storyteller who will bring you on a journey about how she got involved with the Ministry Against the Death Penalty. This ministry believes in the dignity of all people, expresses mercy and justice by standing side by side with those who are outcasts in our society, promotes compassionate alternatives to the death penalty, and supports victims’ families.

 

 

SR. HELEN PREJEAN, a member of the Congregation of St. Joseph, has been instrumental in sparking dialogue on the death penalty and helping to shape the Catholic Church’s opposition to state executions. Her involvement with poor, inner-city residents in the St. Thomas Housing Project in New Orleans led her to prison ministry where she counsels death row inmates in the Louisiana State Penitentiary. She has accompanied six men to their death. Sr. Prejean’s book, Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty in the United States, became a movie, an opera and a play for high schools and colleges. She has also written The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions, and is presently at work on another book, River of Fire: My Spiritual Journey. She helped found Survive, a victims’ advocacy group in New Orleans. Sr. Prejean is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Pacem in Terris Award, and a Robert M. Holstein ‘Faith Doing Justice’ Award from the Ignatian Solidarity Network.