Struggling to Accept Church Teaching

A letter to the editor in the January 16, 2005 edition of Our Sunday Visitor struck me as a powerful witness to all of us who struggle (or have struggled) with some aspect of Church teaching.  The issue in this particular letter was the death penalty, but it could have been any number of issues concnerning faith or morals.  The letter writer says that he has always supported the death penalty.  "However, if the Church tells me I must not advocate the death penalty (and its not always easy to tell whether the Church has spoken or whether we're getting the opinion of a biased cleric), then I will reluctantly obey.  As the editorial put it, 'we may not be able to do that with much enthusiasm' in some cases, but if that's what I'm asked to do by the legitimate representative of Christ on earth, then I'll do it."