"Our Creator -- who made us out of love for love -- has dominion over all life. As children of this loving, merciful God we are led to a profound respect for every human life, from its very beginning until its natural end. Knowing that the state can protect itself in ways other than through the death penalty, we have repeatedly asked that the practice be abandoned. Our broken world cries out for justice, not the additional violence or vengeance the death penalty will exact.