COMMENTARY: Too Many Funerals, Too Many Killings

c. 2003 Religion News Service (Samuel K. Atchison is an ordained minister and has worked as a policy analyst and social worker to the homeless. He currently is a prison chaplain in Trenton, N.J., and a fellow of the George H. Gallup International Institute in Princeton, N.J.) (UNDATED) Bear with me for a moment. Murder […]

c. 2003 Religion News Service

(Samuel K. Atchison is an ordained minister and has worked as a policy analyst and social worker to the homeless. He currently is a prison chaplain in Trenton, N.J., and a fellow of the George H. Gallup International Institute in Princeton, N.J.)

(UNDATED) Bear with me for a moment. Murder is never easy to process, even if it is a common occurrence in the inner city. After many years in urban ministry _ and far too many funerals _ the concept of life cut short by an assailant’s hand remains difficult for me to comprehend.


Now comes word from my barber that his sister was shot to death on Saturday night (June 7). Apparently she and her husband had just closed the bar they owned when a regular customer and longtime neighbor entered through the bar’s service entrance demanding they sell him some liquor.

Seeing that the man was already drunk and knowing of his battle with throat cancer, my friend’s sister sought to comfort him and encouraged him to go home. An argument ensued and, within a few minutes, my friend’s sister was dead and her husband seriously wounded. A short time later, a gun battle with the police left the assailant and a bystander wounded as well.

That violence has increasingly become part of the American way of life cannot be questioned. Just ask the family of 9-year-old Jennette Tamayo, who was kidnapped from her San Jose, Calif., home, only moments after coming home from school June 6. Thankfully, she was found alive two days later and an arrest was subsequently made in the case.

Yet the damage has been done. For when violence is inflicted on one’s person, even if the victim survives the attack, the sense of vulnerability _ of having been personally violated _ remains long afterward.

Just ask Debbie Morris. In 1980, 16-year-old Morris _ then Debbie Cuevas _ was kidnapped and raped repeatedly during an attack in which her boyfriend, Mark Brewster, was beaten, stabbed, shot in the back of the head and left for dead.

Miraculously, Morris was released by her captors and subsequently was able to direct police to Brewster, who also survived the attack. Her testimony led to the arrests and convictions of Robert Willie and Joseph Vaccaro, whose story was recounted in Sister Helen Prejean’s 1993 book, “Dead Man Walking.”

In her own book, “Forgiving the Dead Man Walking,” Morris tells in discreet but painful detail of the conflicting emotions of anger, isolation, embarrassment, guilt, remorse and compassion she battled in the years after her attack. Forgiving her assailants _ particularly Willie, who masterminded the attack and was subsequently executed for murdering another coed _ was an arduous process.


Indeed, as Morris wrestled with depression and alcoholism, she was forced to reckon not only with her hatred of Willie _ and her resentment of his spiritual adviser, Prejean _ but also the feeling she had been abandoned by her frequently absent mother, and by God.

To her amazement, Morris found that as she allowed God to soften her heart toward those she resented, she began to realize God had not abandoned her at all. To the contrary, in her anger and avoidance, she had abandoned God. And now, as she allowed God to enable her to forgive, she was able to receive the healing she needed.

To be sure, such epiphanies are cold comfort to those for whom the pain of violent crime remains fresh. For them, what is most important is that justice be served and appropriate punishment be meted out.

Yet as Debbie Morris’ story shows, even if the assailant doesn’t deserve forgiveness, the victim most assuredly does.

DEA END ATCHISON

Donate to Support Independent Journalism!

Donate Now!