Tonight the Coliseum will be lit and Romans will keep vigil in front of it. They do this every time a death sentence is carried out in our country. They may do this whenever anyone, anywhere is executed as the punishment handed down by a state, I don’t know. Seems like that might lead to a lot of Coliseum lighting and vigil keeping. All I know for sure is that they do it for us.
Tonight John Allen Muhammad will be put to death by lethal injection for committing murder in the State of Virginia. Of this he is definitely guilty. I do not know if he is repentant. That he was responsible for the deaths of at least 10 people is without question, and his methods seem incomprehensible. If he is sane, he would appear beyond the help of rehabilitation. If he is insane, one could reasonably consider him incurable.
So, it is not in defense of or in hope for John Allen Muhammad that I feel deep misgivings on this night of his execution. What we as a society decide to do about a person in his state of being says little about him, but is speaks volumes about us. I worry that we extend a death sentence to the families of his victims with a promise of closure that I doubt will ever truly come. I fear we delude ourselves by thinking that the example of his death will make us safer by giving other would be murderers pause. I fear we try to satisfy ourselves that justice has been done through vengeance.
God knows I don’t know what to do about this, and I doubt I could look the child of one of John Allen Muhammad’s victims in the eye and say that the man who killed her daddy should live. But if we as a people believe we are better than those who would murder in cold blood, why do we punish with death? People of the world, pray for us that we might discern more fully how to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God.