The Functional Use of Religion When Faced with Imminent Death: An Analysis of Death Row Inmates’ Last Statements

ABSTRACT

This article draws on religious coping theory to (1) assess how death row inmates use religion to cope with imminent death; (2) evaluate whether certain coping methods are more frequently used than others; and (3) track change in the use of coping methods from 1982 to 2016. A hierarchy of religious coping methods reveals that efforts to gain comfort from and closeness to God, is followed by efforts to establish spiritual intimacy with others. By comparison, coping methods to gain control, signal transformation, or draw meaning from imminent death, are far less frequently used and their usage decreased over time.

KEYWORDS:

• Death row
• last statements
• religious coping theory

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Conrad Cantor and Moody Saint Louis for valuable research assistance. Don Waisanen and Christina Balboa offered helpful comments and suggestions on a previous version of this article as did seminar participants of the Austin W. Marxe School of Public and International Affairs at Baruch College. As special thanks to Kenneth I. Pargament who graciously answered a brief query regarding his version of religious coping theory. Finally, I am indebted to attorney Marc Minor who directed me to hearsay exceptions and the meaning of excited utterances in the law.

Notes

^1. The terms “religion” and “spirituality” are used interchangeably throughout this article even though the two are conceptually and empirically distinct (Fuller 2001; Masci and Lipka 2016). Religion is associated with formal, institutional expression, while spirituality denotes individual, subjective, and freeing expression (Hill and Pargament 2003).

^2. Along these lines, in John’s account of the Gospels, Jesus himself is noted to have said, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die” (John 11:25).

^3. For a review, see Pargament (2002).

^4. See Vollum and Longmire (2007) for a unique analysis of statements made by co-victims (e.g., family and friends of homicide victims) during executions in Texas.

^5. Vollum and Longmire (2009:10) define “valid” as an actual “last statement or an indication that the inmate declined to give a statement.”

^6. A full list of the most common coping expressions are available from the author upon request. The precise proportions assigned to the most frequent expressions may vary across studies due to differences in sample sizes and coding strategies. More important than the precise magnitude of proportions is the consistent finding that religious/spiritual expressions remain among the top two or three coping strategies across multiple studies (Heflick 2005; Schuck and Ward 2008; Vollum and Longmire 2009).

^7. I thank an anonymous reviewer for suggesting this inquiry.

^8. I thank an anonymous reviewer for suggesting this approach.

^9. Before 1995, executions in Texas were comparatively sparse, so the first time period (1982–95) encompasses executions that took place over a 13-year period. After 1995, executions accelerated to such an extent that aggregating the data into four- five-year time spans generated roughly as many executions as the first time period. On December 1, 1996, Texas implemented its policy allowing immediate family members of victims and those with a close relationship to the victim to witness the execution in person. The policy was amended in 1998 to also include friends of the victim’s family (Rice et al. 2009; TDCJ 2017).

^10. A full list and description of Pargament et al.’s (2011) religious coping subcategories may be found in Appendix Table A1.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ryan A. Smith

Ryan A. Smith is an Associate Professor in the Austin W. Marxe School of Public and International Affairs, Baruch College (CUNY), and the former Lillie and Nathan Ackerman Chair of Social Justice (2011-2015) and former Scholar in Residence at the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research at Harvard University. His research interests include race, ethnic and gender stratification at work; racial attitudes in America; and the functional use of religion when coping with stress.