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October 12, 2026, Adrian, Michigan – On behalf of Adrian Dominican Sisters and Associates, the General Council of the Congregation issued the following statement in opposition to the Trump Administration’s plans for a public execution.

The Adrian Dominican Sisters join with other Catholic leaders, including the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in strongly opposing the sensationalistic public viewing of a firing squad execution of the man convicted of the Fort Hood, Texas, mass shooting. The horrific assault in 2009 took the lives of 13 women and men, injuring 32 others, both soldiers and civilians.

As Catholic Sisters we reverence life and our hearts ache at the taking of any human life. We have long rejected the death penalty believing, as Pope Leo XIV recently stated, that the common good can be “safeguarded and the requirements of justice can be met without recourse to capital punishment.” We see the death penalty as “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person,” as Pope Leo states. It is the ultimate act of dehumanization.

We are horrified by the Trump Administration’s recent announcement that it would carry out the execution by firing squad and open it to public viewing by livestream. While, as the USCCB states, the actions of a mass murderer can never be condoned, the decision to publicly livestream the execution “is a barbaric promotion of a culture of death.”

We call on the Trump Administration to retract their intention to carry out this barbaric act. We vehemently oppose “the use of public media and social media to broadcast, distribute, or sensationalize the execution of any person,” as LCWR states. “We believe that turning the taking of human life into a public spectacle violates the values we hold in trust and the Gospel that women religious have dedicated their lives to proclaiming.”

We join the USCCB in asserting that “The word of God exhorts us: ‘do not repay anyone evil for evil' (Romans 12:17). The public execution even of one who has done grave harm will only further undermine the moral fabric of our nation and be a blight on the conscience of its people.”

We pray the Trump Administration will see the danger and reverse its decision, but should it persist in carrying out the execution as a public spectacle, we join LCWR in calling on all people of conscience “to refuse to watch, share, or circulate such content, recognizing that our participation, even as spectators, can contribute to a culture that diminishes human dignity.”

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Members of the Adrian Dominican Sisters General Council are: Prioress Elise D. García, OP; Sister Frances Nadolny, OP, General Councilor; Sister Lorraine Réaume, OP, Vicaress and General Councilor; and Sisters Corinne Sanders, OP, and Mary Soher, OP, General Councilors.

October 9, 2026, Adrian, Michigan – From October through December 2026, residents in Adrian and the greater Lenawee County area will see and hear messages of peace everywhere: on prominent billboards, in advertisements in local newspapers, in 10-second spots on WLEN Radio, and in videos and images posted to the Congregation’s YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn accounts. 

The Adrian Dominican Congregation’s Make Peace campaign is an expansion of previous video and social media campaigns focusing on seeking truth and reverencing life. “Seek truth, make peace, reverence life” is part of the vision statement approved by the Adrian Dominican Sisters during the Congregation’s General Chapter in 2004. 

“With the urging and support of the General Council and because of the great need for peace in our world, we expanded the Make Peace promotion to be multi-faceted,” said Angie Kessler, Director of Communications. 

Beginning the first full week of October and for following months, billboards in high visibility areas of Lenawee County will proclaim the unifying theme of the campaign: “God has called us to live in peace,” taken from 1 Corinthians 7:15. In addition, ads have been placed in local newspapers: The Lenawee Voice, five local newspapers in the Meadowbrook Media family (Tecumseh, Clinton, Brooklyn, Adrian, and Blissfield), and the fall issue of Homefront Magazine. The campaign also features 10-second spots from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Mondays to Saturdays on WLEN Radio, for a total of 84 spots per week.

The campaign will also be featured on the Congregation’s social media: Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn. 

“We chose this time of year to promote our message of making peace not only because our world is in such dire need, but we’re also cognizant of our mid-term elections in November and December as the annual Dominican Month for Peace, this year focusing on Mexico,” Angie explained. 

“The purpose is not only to teach folks from our Dominican perspective what it means to make peace, but hopefully to inspire people to be active peace makers themselves,” Angie said. Being a peace maker can be found in simple acts in our everyday life, she said. “We’re hoping to inspire people to think and act in areas where they can make a difference.”

Resources for peace-making can be found on the Adrian Dominican Sisters public website.

St. Paul’s message in the campaign, “We are called to live in peace,” follows on a quote from St. Paul featured in a 2025 billboard campaign in Lenawee County, proclaiming “Love is Kind” (1 Corinthians 13:4). That was part of a campaign initiated by Region VII of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), Congregations of Catholic Sisters in Michigan and Indiana. The “Love is Kind” message was “very well received in the community,” Angie said. The hope is that the Make Peace Campaign will also create conversation and action.