In Practice

As most of you know, I spent my freshman year of college at Syracuse University before transferring across the street. It was December 21, 1988 when 35 students from that university were flying home from studying abroad on Pan Am flight 103 and were horrifically killed along with 235 other people in what came to became known as the Lockerbie bombing (it was seriously horrific—read the account of how they all died and it'll churn your stomach. No one died from the bombing; they died from falling for two minutes while tornado-like winds ripped off their clothes. Apparently most of them regained consciousness as they fell closer to earth so they knew what was coming as they were strapped to their seats. The 11 killed on the ground (including two families) were literally incinerated; nothing was left of them. The two wings of the plane both landed in a crater where houses had been. They too were burned to nothing. The only way they discovered where both wings landed was by counting the only thing that remained from the houses, families and the wings: screws.)
Every year on the anniversary of the bombing there is a moment of silence on campus and the bell tower tolls once for each student lost. Their photos are featured in the student union with their biographies; 35 students are named prestigious Remembrance Scholars in honor of those lost. Syracuse has a student-exchange program with a school in Lockerbie, Scotland to keep that bond fresh. It is my opinion that SU has done a fine job keeping the memory of those students fresh, even twenty years after the tragedy. Students today live with that tragedy in their minds.

And so I bring this experience to the recent release of al-Megrahi, the only man convicted in the deaths of those 270 people. After serving seven years of a life sentence he has been released on “compassionate” grounds and I am struggling mightily with all of it. Mathematically, he served just 9 days for each life he took. That seems unacceptable to me. But I believe in compassion, I think. I want to forgive, to not feel a sense of outrage that this man is being allowed to go home to die. I want to believe that I believe in compassion, even in the face of utter evil. That the only way to end the cycle of violence is unabashed grace.

But in practice, I'm less forthcoming with forgiveness. I'm American; we sure do love vengeance and grudges even while we extol bible verses when they conform to our existing beliefs. We want to see someone held accountable for every injustice and we want to show no mercy (unless its to us). I want him to pay for his crime, but who am I to say he hasn't already? How are we to sentence one to death based solely on the worst moment in their life? What about all the other moments? How do I know what is in his heart, how do I know the crime hasn't haunted him for 21 years (that would be 28 days per life he took), that it will haunt him until his last breath? I don't. As a Christian I am called to forgive carte blanche, not when it is necessarily easy or justified. And by choosing to only forgive when it is easy, when it is offered, when it is convenient then really, what is my compassion worth?

I don't have a conclusion. This isn't easy on anybody.