Communion, thus "expressing pastoral concern for recovering alcoholics, enabling the participation of children and youth, and supporting the church's witness of abstinence." Moreover, in 2011 and 2012, the United Methodist Church's General Board of Church and Society called on all United Methodists to abstain from alcohol for Lent. Capital punishment The United Methodist Church, along with some other Methodist churches, condemns capital punishment, saying that it cannot accept retribution or social vengeance as a reason for taking human life. The Church also holds that the death penalty falls unfairly and unequally upon marginalized persons including the poor, the uneducated, ethnic and religious minorities, and persons with mental and emotional illnesses. The United Methodist Church also believes that Jesus explicitly repudiated the lex talionis in Matthew 5:38–39 and abolished the death penalty in John 8:7. The General Conference of the United Methodist Church calls for its bishops to uphold opposition to capital punishment and for governments to enact an immediate moratorium on carrying out the death penalty sentence. Creation The United Methodist Church, like many mainline Protestant denominations and the Roman Catholic Church, has determined that there is no conflict between faith and the theory of evolution. Some clergy have stated that "it's time for people of faith to accept evolution." Additionally, the UMC officially affirms the theory of evolution and "opposes introducing theories such as Creationism or Intelligent Design into public school curriculum." In 2016, the denomination denied approval for a creationist group to be officially represented at the church's General Conference. Euthanasia The United Methodist Church is opposed to euthanasia and assisted suicide. The official stance mentions that "The church has an obligation to see that all persons have access to needed pastoral and medical care and therapy in those circumstances that lead to loss of self-worth, suicidal despair, and/or the desire to seek physician-assisted suicide." It also states that "If death is deliberately sought as the means to relieve suffering, that must be understood as direct and intentional taking of life ... The United Methodist tradition opposes the taking of life as an offense against God's sole dominion over life, and an abandonment of hope and humility before God." The United Methodist Church, represented by Bishop Scott Jones of the Texas Annual Conference, on behalf of the Houston Methodist Research Institute, and the Roman Catholic Church, represented by Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, of the Pontifical Academy for Life, signed