The Catholic Church's Stand on the Death Penalty

The Roman Catholic Church has more than 64 million members in the United States. That is about one in ten Americans.

The Catholic Church has a strong stand on the holiness and dignity of human life. It is mostly known for its decree that abortion is murder. Its members are told that if they have an abortion, they have committed a sin -- murder.

What is less known is that the Catholic Church also opposes the death penalty. On the web site http://www.americancatholic.org/, is the quote, "The Catholic Church opposes the death penalty in nearly all cases."

Pope John Paul II issued a statement called Evangelium Vitae (translation means "Teaching about Life") in 1995. This letter to the members of the Catholic Church spells out the church's position on capital punishment. (All statements issued by popes are considered to be issued by God himself, since the Catholic Church believes that the pope represents God on earth.)

Basically, the Catholic Church says that all human life is precious, and so long as a person is no longer a threat to society, he or she should not be killed. That means that if someone is in jail, where they can't hurt anyone else, they do not deserve to die. The pope says this because, in his view, all people have dignity, and all people can repent their sins and try to live different lives.

So the Catholic Church would not support letting criminals go free, but so long as the criminals are in jail, they should be allowed to live.

According to the teachings of the Catholic Church, the families of victims must be able to forgive the criminal who has done them wrong, because forgiveness is part of being a Christian.

Nick Virgilio

Nick Virgilio was born in Camden in 1928. He grew up with two brothers in the Fairview section of Camden. his father was a violinist.

Virgilio graduated from Camden High in 1946 and entered the Navy that same year. When he left the Navy in 1948 he enrolled at Temple University and got his degree in 1952.

In the 1950s Virgilio worked as a radio announcer in various locations. In 1958 he returned to Camden. He lived there the rest of his life.

Virgilio discovered haiku in 1962 and began to write it right away. Like Walt Whitman, he was not able to support himself as a poet, but he did begin to get a following that grew over the years. One of his first supporters was Father Michael Doyle at Camden's Sacred Heart Church.

His first collection of poems was published in 1985. By then, Nick Virgilio was considered the best haiku poet in the English language. Haiku is more difficult to write in English than in Japanese, so Virgilio experimented with the form, changing the syllables sometimes as needed, but keeping the three-line form.

Virgilio's youngest brother, Larry, was killed in the Vietnam War. This inspired some of the most famous of Virgilio's haikus. Many others were inspired by his life in Camden, the environment he lived in, and the people he met.

He died in 1989 as he was waiting to film a television show about his poetry. He is buried in Harleigh Cemetery, in a grave that can be seen from Walt Whitman's burial place.

Walt Whitman, America's Poet

Walt Whitman was born May 31, 1819 on Long Island in New York. He was one of nine children in a close family. His father was a carpenter.

Whitman ended his formal schooling at age 11 and went to work for a printing press. This is where his love of words began. By the age of 16 he was already writing poetry, but at first most of what he published was prose -- stories and newspaper articles. He founded his own newspaper on Long Island in 1839.

As a young man, Whitman worked for newspapers and wrote fiction. He traveled alone across the country and spent time wandering the streets of New York. In 1850 he began work on his best known book of poems, Leaves of Grass.

Walt Whitman's poetry was revolutionary for its time. In his day, proper poetry had to rhyme, and it had to be about "polite" subjects. Whitman wrote in "free verse" -- no rhyme, no specific length of lines. He also wrote about topics that were considered off-limits, like the beauty of the human body and sexuality. The publishers who looked at Leaves of Grass refused to publish it, so Whitman published the first edition of it himself.

Leaves of Grass was praised by another famous American poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson, but most people who read it thought it was obscene. Whitman made hardly any money off his poetry and had to work full-time and write on the side.

In 1862, Whitman's brother George was injured while fighting in the Civil War. Whitman left New York City and moved to Washington, DC, where his brother was recuperating in a hospital. Even after his brother left the hospital, Whitman stayed on, working as a nurse's aid and writing letters home from the wounded soldiers. This experience changed him. His poetry after that experience was darker and sadder than the high energy of Leaves of Grass.

During and after the Civil War, Whitman worked in Washington, DC in various positions for the government. During most of his life he was not able to support himself by writing.

In the early 1870s, an edition of Leaves of Grass was published in England. The English loved Whitman's poetry, and finally he began making money and earning the fame he deserved. At the same time his health began to fail. In 1873 he moved to CAMDEN, NEW JERSEY to be with his dying mother and his brother. He lived in CAMDEN, NEW JERSEY the rest of his life and is buried there in Harleigh Cemetery, next to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital.

Walt Whitman's house is a museum in downtown Camden, across the street from the county jail.

Whitman is considered the best American poet and is often called "America's Poet." His work took all the poetry in the world in a new direction and led to the variety of poetry we read today.

October 12-15, 2010

This week we will begin organizing our persuasive essays. Here are our tasks:

October 12: "Plus, Minus, Hmmmm?" Chart. This helps us to think about what our opponent might argue against us.

October 13: Personal story. This helps us to "hook" our readers and involve them in our writing.

October 14: Graphic organizer: This helps us decide which of our arguments is the best.

October 15 is PC Friday. Don't forget to bring your reading book!

Homework this week:

*The graphic organizer will be due on Tuesday, October 19. If you do not complete it in class, you will have to finish it at home. Also due on Tuesday, your personal story connecting you to your essay topic.

October 4 - 8

This week we will begin to write a persuasive essay.

We will start by writing some traditional paragraphs. You have two paragraphs to write. One is about school uniforms. The other is about students being able to give grades to teachers. I will grade the best one for your report card.

Our next grade will be a "making connections" sheet for our PC reading. It will be classwork completed on Friday.

Next week we will begin to organize our persuasive essays. You will be graded on your graphic organizer. I will hand that out on October 12, and it will be due on October 14.

September 27-October 1

This week we will be learning how to make connections to our reading. Effective readers enjoy their books more when they connect in the following ways:

*text to self (t-s): when we can connect what we're reading to our own lives.

*text to world (t-w): when we can compare what we're reading to events that happen worldwide.

*text to text (t-t): when our reading reminds us of another book or movie we have read or seen.

*text within text (t-w-t): when an event in our book repeats something that has happened earlier in the story.


This week you will choose a project to complete based on your Personal Choice (PCR) book. Projects will be due Tuesday, October 5. You will have some time to work on the project in class, but you will probably have to do some homework for it as well.

October begins this week!

Visualization

This week in English I we will be studying VISUALIZATION.

We will define visualization and learn how effective readers use it to draw meaning and enjoyment from texts. Have you ever said, "Picture This?" Apply it to what you're reading and create pictures in your mind!

CP English will apply visualization techniques to the poem "An Exceptional Tree."
English Honors will apply visualization techniques to the poem "A Little Man in the Grass."

We will work separately and in groups to create visualizations of poems and our Personal Choice reading books.

Please note: Parent letters were due last Friday. If you have not returned your parent letter to me with their signature and contact information, please see me for another copy.














Here is our first exercise in visualization:


I am going to describe a common object that you see many places. The object is rectangular and has an outer layer of shiny brown paper, crimped at each end. On the front of the shiny paper sit two words that are green in color, lightly outlined in red, on a white background that follows the shapes of the letters. Three dark brown lines swirl from underneath the letters. When you move the paper on this object, it crackles.

Inside the paper lies a rectangular object that consists of an outer layer, dark brown, and inner layers that are light spongy brown and swirling caramel. If you break the object, the outer layer might fracture. The spongy interior breaks cleanly, but the caramel-colored section will stretch as the two sides of the rectangle are pulled in opposite directions.

Picture this! What is it?


















Did you get it?













































Let's try again:

I have another rectangular object in bright shiny silver paper, crimped at each end. The brightly colored title begins with a number, followed by a word. The number and the letters in the word are bright red, outlined in white, and then outlined in blue. There's a long red ribbon underneath the word, and it has words inside it with white letters that describe the object in a way that makes you want to eat it. Another yellow banner in the corner, above the letters, describes how this object is different from others of its kind.

Inside the silver paper lies another rectangle. This one has swirls of medium brown that cover an inner core of light brown-to-putty-colored spongy material. If you cut this object carefully with a knife, it comes apart perfectly and is great to share with a friend.

Picture this! What is it?




















Did you get it this time?
































HOW LONG UNTIL HALLOWEEN?