Conference calls for Christian response to the death penalty

Published: 2006-10-06

EMMITSBURG, Md. (CNS) -- Shannon Schieber is described by her mother Vicki as "a gift beyond anything you could possibly believe," a young woman who lived her Catholic faith in every way. That's what made May 7, 1998, such a terrible day in the Schieber family. It was on that day when Shannon was raped and murdered in her apartment near the end of her first year of graduate school on a full scholarship at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. Despite her overwhelming loss, Schieber, a Catholic, said she has forgiven the man who took her daughter's life. Not only that, she asked that he not be put to death for his crimes and that the death penalty itself be abolished. Schieber, who lives in the Washington Archdiocese, was one of several death penalty opponents who spoke Sept. 30 at Mount St. Mary's University in Emmitsburg for a conference called "Witness and Action: Christian Responses to the Death Penalty in Maryland." About 100 people attended the daylong event, which was designed to raise awareness within the religious community about the death penalty.

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