c. 1997 Religion News Service

(Leslie Williams is a professor of literature and author of”Night Wrestling”(Word).)

UNDATED _ March 29, 1992. A Sunday supper of beans and cornbread. A novel left open on the couch. Suddenly, two young men shoulder their way through the front door. With a tire iron and a cedar post, they crack the skulls of an elderly couple and their middle-aged daughter, recently seated at the table.

The boys steal a spoon collection and some knickknacks. Before they leave, they stab the victims eight or nine times in the throat _ just to make sure.

Five years later, and it’s the end of National Victims’ Rights Week. This week is very personal for me. Memories of my aunt, uncle and cousin’s violent deaths have slammed back into my consciousness. These images have never really left, of course. They’ve simply nibbled away at my life, day by day.

Watching Ron Goldman’s sister on TV brings with it a passionate identification with other victims of violent crime. I applaud the intentions of a week that forces our country to stare down what most of us would rather scurry away from in shame.

Blood-spattered walls do not match the decor of our lives. Or the sanctity of our faiths.

This week also brings memories of my struggles with that thrashing octopus of a commandment _ forgiveness. Surely, when Jesus told us to forgive our enemies, he didn’t mean murderers. Wrong. As the years have passed, forgiveness has turned out to be a many-tentacled thing. A fight to the death in the deep waters of my faith.

First, I had to forgive the Texas press, who broadcasted the likely possibility that my uncle had gotten into an altercation. Dying was thus his fault for having a quarrel. As if he’d brought his gruesome death on himself.

Next, I had to forgive the police and Texas Rangers who’d gotten stuck on the wrong suspect for well over a year _ a long, miserable year.

Then, when the two boys were finally apprehended, I had to forgive them in all their greasy-haired, smirking glory. In the first young man’s trial, the jury gave him the death sentence. But it was the second trial that tested my faith so sorely.

Daily my family sat on the hard benches in a courtroom in Junction, Texas. The young man admitted he murdered my relatives for the thrill. He admitted he wasn’t sorry. Then, when this cocky teen-ager turned around and stared my mother down, I wanted to grab the murder weapon and beat him over the head.

I was not kidding.

Which meant, if I take the Sermon on the Mount seriously, at that moment, I was no better than he. Which also meant I had to forgive myself .

But that wasn’t the end, or the worst. Possibly the most excruciating part of an already excruciating experience was the system of trial itself. This crime was unquestionably a violent, premeditated act. The boys had scoped the premises two weeks in advance.

Yet we listened to a teamwork of defense lawyer and a psychiatrist take away every shred of responsibility from the defendant: The poor young man (now the victim) was abused as a child. Statistics proved he would turn to crime. He had no choice because he was male. Further, this totally helpless person was clinically depressed and should have been on medication.

The jury believed him. His problems were not his fault. The system robbed the real victims _ my relatives _ of justice. And a voice.

In an ironic twist of fate, the system ended up robbing the killer of the worst thing of all. He walked away apparently helpless,”innocent.”But the lawyer and psychiatrist had taken away his right to his personal choices and his responsibility.

They also took away an opportunity to repent. If we are not sorry for what we have done, we cannot repent. If we do not repent, we do not receive forgiveness, or everlasting life.

The American justice system gave the young killer his earthly life, but they have taken away his chance for the kingdom of heaven.

After all is said and done, I have had to forgive a system that seems to rob everyone involved _ robbers and victims. National Victims’ Rights week gives us pause.

MJP END WILLIAMS