beaware

Revenge, Capital Punishment, Jesus & the Religious Right

“If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also.” Profound words attributed Jesus of Nazareth in the international best seller “The Bible.” Strangely enough, this book (or more accurately, this collection of stories, quasi-historical accounts, poetry and myths collected and selectively canonized by the medieval church, which has recently been elevated to the literal and inerrant “word of God”) has much to say about the topic of “revenge.” The basic thrust of the argument being: Don’t do it! Now am I appealing to the Bible and words attributed to Jesus in an effort “prove” my belief that revenge is self-destructive, counter-productive and wrong (as if the Bible can be used to “prove” anything other than its own inaccuracies and internal contradictions)? Not a chance! Although I am happy to agree with the historical (or legendary) Jesus and the Bible in this case, as I am in many cases, because, after all, what is religion if not a human attempt to makes sense of our own highest ideals and why are always find ourselves falling short of them.

Unfortunately this same book also contains a good measure of human ignorance, superstition, prejudice and fear-mongering which I feel compelled by reason and decency to reject. But no, I am not sighting the Bible as a fundamentalist does, in some vain attempt to prove that God is on my side, but rather to point out a profound irony and contraction within our body politic today. Namely, the Christian (or Religious) Right’s nearly universal support for a pointless and vengeful institution known as the death penalty (with the possible exception of right-wing Catholics, which constitute a minority within the Christian Right and have varying views on capital punishment). But the fact still holds true that you will be hard-pressed to find a fundamentalist evangelical that is not an enthusiastic supporter of the death penalty. And one really has to wonder how a group that is willing to go to such lengths save a zygote or an undifferentiated stem cell could at the same time be so enthusiastic about killing living, breathing human beings.

Setting this puzzling situation aside for a moment, allow me to express my belief that in spite of all the justifications put forward, the only real purpose the death penalty serves is to satisfy our society’s knee-jerk desire for revenge. We are told that the death penalty acts as a deterrent and is only exercised on calculating, cold-blooded killers who have been proven guilty beyond any reasonable doubt. We are led to believe that it is applied fairly across racial and socio-economic lines and that it is a waste of tax-payers’ money to keep these people behind bars for life when it is so much easier to just kill them. Although the majority of voting Americans seem to believe these arguments, they are never-the-less demonstrably false.

First, the argument that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to murder. Has anyone ever stopped to seriously think about this claim? First they are asking us to believe that a person who either A) commits a crime of passion or B) is involved in some organized crime syndicate or street gang, in which murder and the threat of murder is a normal part of daily life, either A) takes the time to think through the consequences of their actions before pulling the trigger or B) fears death enough to choose another lifestyle. If that isn’t ridiculous enough, they also expect us to believe that in the case of either A or B that the possibility of being put to sleep is somehow going to be more compelling than the thought of spending the rest of their life in solitary confinement to contemplate their actions. When one takes the time to think about either of these underlying assumptions, they become absurd, and yet these mantras are repeated anyway.

Second, let’s take up the argument that the death penalty is only used on calculating cold-blooded killers who have proven guilty beyond any reasonable doubt (because the justice system is so overwhelmingly liberal, right?). False on both accounts! While it is undoubtedly true for some, this claim serves to gloss over the executions of the clinically insane and the mentally retarded (who, if violent, belong in maximum-security mental institutions); those who convicted of 1st degree murder for unintentional man-slaughter (which is more common than people like to believe); or those that are outright innocent. In the case of the mentally retarded, our own President, “compassionate conservative” that he is, put to death a young man who was so mentally inept that when was being led to his execution it was apparent to the guards that he didn’t even understand that being put to death meant he wasn’t coming back to his cell afterward. And in an age when public prosecutors, district attorneys and judges site the number of people they’ve had executed as a badge of pride and a reason to reelect them, and public defenders are so over-booked and given such meager resources, it is not the least bit surprising that people are falsely convicted or given the death penalty for crimes it was never intended for.

And lastly, those who are innocent: Some will be surprised to hear that a recent Republican Governor of Illinois, George Ryan, himself a life-long supporter of the death penalty, called a moratorium on all executions in his state upon the realization that after executing 12 people on his watch, 13 others awaiting execution were proven innocent by DNA evidence. The realization that he had about a 50/50 chance of executing an innocent person turned the Governor’s stomach, causing him rethink his beliefs. If this could happen in Illinois, imagine how much worse the odds might be poor, back-water states like Alabama, or Mississippi. And let us not forget the conservative movement in this country to allow the execution of minors. You can’t smoke, you can’t drink, you can’t vote, but you can be put to death (even if you were too young to contemplate the consequences of your actions).

As for the argument that the death penalty is sought and applied equally across racial and socio-economic lines, this claim is so outrageously false that I won’t even dignify it with an argument. I will however direct you to two very informative websites that deal with this issue www.DeathpPenalty.org and the Southern Poverty Law Center at www.SPLcenter.org. Lastly, as for the callous argument that failing to execute so-called criminals is too expensive; wrong again! Dead wrong in fact. Across the United States, and I have yet to find one instance where it isn’t more costly to go through the appropriate and often constitutionally required trial and appeals process in order to execute someone, than to imprison them for life. In fact the average capital trial in Texas costs three times as much as it would to imprison an individual for 40 years and here in California the Sacramento Bee conducted an investigation that found our state would save approximately $90 million a year if it were to abolish the death penalty. Not a bad idea in our current fiscal condition.

In other words, all these arguments fall flat, leaving us with only one remaining justification that few are willing to defend: revenge. But before returning to the heart of my argument, just a few last observations: First, consider the fact that ours is one of the very last modern industrial democracies to use the death penalty. In fact every year since 1997 the United Nations Commission on Human Rights has passed a resolution calling on countries that have not yet abolished the death penalty in principal to at very least establish a moratorium on executions. The latest resolution, adopted in April 2004, was co-sponsored by whopping 76 member states. What countries you may ask? Seeing as 76 is too many to list here, here’s just 15 countries that have abolished the death penalty: Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Poland, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. For the sake of comparison, here is a list 15 other nations who, like us, retain the death penalty: Afghanistan, Botswana, China, Cuba, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Liberia, Libya, Pakistan, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Syria, and Uzbekistan. If it doesn’t make you stop and think consider the following: Liberal or conservative, does history suggest that giving the government the power to execute its own citizens is such a good idea? Just think of the genocide and ethnic cleansing that could have been prevented if rounding up and executing one’s own citizenry (for any reason) was universally unacceptable. Furthermore, take note that while our Constitution didn’t originally ban capitol punishment, as it was widespread at the time (as was slavery and dueling), the founders included no clause requiring it either. But back to this irony that seems to pit Christian conservatives against the teachings of the very man they claim to emulate.

Having been raised a button-down ultra-conservative fundamentalist evangelical myself (yes, believe it or not) I still have to puzzle over this myself. To be honest I can only think of two reasons how this could be. First, perhaps its their obsession with the concept of Hell or their belief that Armageddon in imminent, in which God will quote-on-quote “pour out his wrath,” on everyone except them, with all manner of plagues, famine, at which time the stars will supposedly fall from the sky, the moon will turn to blood and some whore will come ridding on a beast. Perhaps they have read so many volumes of the disturbingly popular series “Left Behind,” that their concept of God has become so vengeful and their distain for the secular majority in this country so caustic, that they have come to fixate on the very idea of punishment. It almost as if, just as they insist whipping their children will keep them growing up to be terrible monsters (yes the Old Testament does say something to this effect, not far from where it gives parents the directive to stone disrespectful children as well), the Christian right has generalized this principal to whole country and is attempting to impose a culture of punishment, to serve as just a taste of what God has in store for us miserable sinners lest we ask Jesus to be our personal savior.

This is the only way I can make sense of this phenomenon from a theological perspective, although it conveniently neglects the passage in which God said “Vengeance is mine,” in other words, “you humans stay out of it.” Or perhaps this could be better understood from a political perspective. Perhaps the Republicans, with the help of the Pat Robertsons, Jerry Falwells, and Louis Sheldons of American have forged such a powerful bond with Christian conservatives in the post Roe v. Wade/gay civil rights era that that these people that they have almost entirely lost their ability to differentiate between their fundamentalist faith and Republicanism; like they have become one in the same. It’s almost as if there was some 11th commandment saying, “Thou shalt cut taxes,” “Thou shalt dishonor treaties,” or “Thou shalt execute retards.” This was certainly my experience growing up in the Pentecostal church. I can remember numerous times, especially around election time, in which I couldn’t tell if I was listening to a sermon or a political rally. In any case, I believe there is a measure of truth to both theories.

But for whatever reason these “Christ-like” people have chosen to neglect one of Jesus’ most valuable teachings, I still believe it’s correct. As both a matter of moral philosophy and practical experience, revenge solves nothing, and unforgiveness eats away at the soul. You can execute, bring back to life, and execute a man a hundred times, but it will never bring back your loved-one, nor will it satisfy your lust for revenge. Nor would outright torture for that matter. Maybe that’s why some many of the world’s religions reject it and emphasize forgiveness and inner peace instead. Perhaps Sir Francis Bacon was right when he said “In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior;” or Martin Luther King when he said "Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love."

Amen brother. Amen.