28 June 2020 :
The Vatican Thursday published “The new Directory for Catechesis”, recalling that the death penalty is “inadmissible.”
The Vatican Thursday published “The new Directory for Catechesis”, emphasizing both its continuity with two previous directories and its new content on contemporary issues such as sex and gender and medical advancements.
About the death penalty, the directory emphasizes the “intrinsic and inalienable dignity” of every human person, and references the teaching of recent popes, especially Pope Francis’ 2018 change to the Catechism of the Catholic Church which declared the death penalty “inadmissible.”
The Directory offers the fundamental theological-pastoral principles and some general orientations which are relevant for the practice of catechesis in our time,” Archbishop Rino Fisichella wrote in the introduction to the directory.
The directory was released in Italian June 25. It will be published in the major global languages.
Fisichella is president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, which is responsible for the new edition of the directory, a 300-page book intended as a guide to bishops, priests, religious, and lay Catholics involved in teaching the Catholic faith.
The new directory follows editions published in 1971 and 1997. The 1971 General Catechetical Directory was created in an effort to systematize the teachings of the Second Vatican Council for catechesis.
Among the issues tackled by the 2020 directory are bioethics, sex and gender, care for creation, and the death penalty.
About the death penalty, the directory emphasizes the “intrinsic and inalienable dignity” of every human person, and references the teaching of recent popes, especially Pope Francis’ 2018 change to the Catechism of the Catholic Church which declared the death penalty “inadmissiable.”
