Christians and the Death Penalty

Joseph Bottum has a fascinating article in this month's issue of First Things on the proper Christian view of the death penalty in deomcratic society. I don't know that this will necessarily change my position- I'm mildly pro-death penalty- but this is the first argument I've run across that could bring my position into alignment with the view put forth by the late Pope John Paul the Great in his encyclical, Evangelium Vitae.