Changing Lanes: A Televised Execution Prompts a Papal Statement

Although Pope Francis amended Catholic social ethics to exclude the death penalty rather than continue to accept the punishment in cases in which no other punishment is practical or available, Pope Leo decided in October, 2026 to make a public statement of his Church’s opposition to the death penalty in reaction to the decision of the Trump administration to televise an upcoming execution live on television. That a woman had recently survived execution attempts by two lethal injections may have primed the pope’s pump, as it were. The danger is that the foray into applied ethics by leaders of a religious organization could conflate ethics and theology. That the latter transcends, and may even violate ethical principles, can easily be forgotten when a religious leader speaks out a lot on ethical issues. In the case of Pope Leo’s statement on capital punishment, a distinctly theological rationale can be found, and, I submit, should have received more emphasis, lest the religious leader be reduced to an ethical critic, or conscience. To be sure, in 2026, the world was very much in need of a public conscience, especially because Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was still underway, as was Israel’s genocide in Gaza and wanton violence in the West Bank—all of this aggression was being done with obvious impunity.

The full essay is at "Changing Lanes."

On Presumptuous Pride: Netanyahu Castigates Europe

While conducting a genocide and even a holocaust in Gaza from 2023 through at least the summer of 2025, the Israeli government was in no position to launch diplomatic threats against either the E.U. or any of its states for recognizing a Palestinian state alongside the Israeli state.[1] At the time, the warrants issued by the ICC for the arrest of Netanyahu and a former defense minister were still outstanding, and no doubt more warrants would be issued for other culprits in the Israeli government and military. I applaud Jews around the world, and especially in Israel, who have had the guts to protest publicly on behalf of human rights in Gaza and against Israel's savage militaristic incursion into Gaza and the related death of tens of thousands and starvation of millions. The human urge of self-preservation is astonishing in that as of August, 2025, so many residents of Gaza were still alive. So, for Netanyahu to charge government officials in the E.U. with being antisemitic is not only incorrect and unfair, but highly presumptuous given the severity of the atrocities unleashed by Netanyahu and his governmental cadre. Regarding both the Israeli protesters and the Netanyahu government, distinguishing the ethical from the theological domains, which are admittedly very much related, is helpful.

The full essay is at "On Presumptuous Pride."

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1. Tal Shalev et al, “Israel Launches Diplomatic Attacks on Its Western Allies Ahead of Palestinian Statehood Recognition,” CNN.com, August 20, 2025.

Pope Francis on Blessing Gay Couples

Pope Francis approved a document in 2023 that allows for “the possibility of blessings for couples in irregular situations and for couples of the same sex”[1] The inclusion of the word, possibility, is important because it gives priests (and their bishops) whose stances on morality are socially conservative an out. That irregular situations are included in the statement—although admittedly they are distinct from “couples of the same sex”—is a hint that the statement would likely be controversial and taken at least by some clergy negatively. So that the document gives the clergy discretion is no small matter. It also matters because of the emotional vulnerability that is entailed in requesting a blessing. At the time, the Church was still being impacted by having been recognized, and thus stigmatized, as the cause of the emotional damage that had been inflicted on children by pedophile clergy over decades. In fact, the resulting declining church attendance may have gone into the motivation for the statement. The document's overarching pastoral purpose in blessing gay couples over conducting a moral critique of homosexuality shows not only how much Pope Francis differed as of 2023 from his predecessor, but also how very much the atrocities against children had changed the orientation of the Vatican. To the extent that a significant number of the pedophile priests and bishops had molested (and were still molesting) boys, any moral critiques getting in the way of blessing loving gay relationships would suffer from a lack of credibility in the face of dripping irony and sordid hypocrisy. Even so, the document can be criticized for failing to distinguish moral from theological critiques of male homosexuality—an oversight mitigated by that fact that the pastoral purpose of the letter subordinates even a theological assessment, for, as Paul wrote, faith without love, especially love whose object is not convenient, is for naught.  

The full essay is at "Pope Francis on Blessing Gay Couples."

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1. Christopher Lamb, “Pope Francis Authorizes Blessings for Same-Sex Couples,” CNN.com, December 18, 2023.

Religious Sources of Business Ethics: How Far Along Are We?

If Business Ethics for Dummies is any indication, the topic of religious sources for business ethics must have gained steam through the first decade of the twenty-first century. Increasing interest in such a topic in the midst of modernity is ironic, or counter-intuitive. For philosophers without any degrees in religion, the temptation might be to dilettante over to this topic in order to proffer an opinion. The result for the rest of us could well be a false sense of the extent of knowledge on the topic.

The entire essay is at "Religious Sources of Business Ethics"

For more on this topic, see God's Gold, Christianized Ethical Leadership, and Spiritual Leadership in Business, all available at Amazon.

Moral Grounds Found Sufficient to Deny Employees Contraception Coverage: Is Morality Distinct from Religion?

In addition to religious organizations and their respective affiliates being excluded from having to include contraceptives in employee health-insurance, non-religious groups with a salient moral stance against the use of the devices are also exempt—this according to a federal judge in the United State. The moral stance need not be associated with any religion. By implication, moral principles are distinct from religious doctrines. Even though religions incorporate moral principles, the latter are based in another domain. I contend that the interlarding of the non-native fauna can dilute and even compromise a given religion, thus undercutting its viability.

The complete essay is at “Moral Principles and Religion.” 

The Ten Commandments on the grounds of the Texas capitol. Do the Ten Commandments serve only a religious purpose? Were they intended to serve only a religious purpose?