Interesting.

I have a Twitter account only to win free give-aways through blogs, but I logged on this week to read the feed.  And every time I opened my Facebook, the News Feed was full of arguing and joking about Osama Bin Laden.  The dialogue (and implications of said words) interest me, and it raises the constant questions nagging my brain and heart about justice.  What is it?  When someone does something terrible that causes pain and the end of life for one (or many in the case of September 11th, which America coincides often with Bin Laden and his death), and justice is "served" through that person's own death, is the right reaction celebration?

By voicing these questions, I am neither affirming his death as the "right" thing or condemning it as "wrong."  My pacifist leanings (which apply generally to the death penalty and war, etc.) go into a chaotic frenzy over an occurrence like this one.  Bin Laden's death raises more questions in my mind than provides answers.  The biggest wondering I have is this:  Did the murder of one man vindicate the lost lives of thousands?  I have a twisted knot in my stomach, because, to me, it does not seem like death in any form redeems what was lost.  I know this is all very idealistic, and my heart breaks at the lack of justice in our world... for the countless hurting, lost, and broken individuals that we deem so often as "beyond repair" and "deserving" of punishment.  I am not saying Bin Laden deserved a break or should have escaped any form of consequence or retribution (including death, again I don't know what I think about it...), but I am saying that my heart longs to believe, has to believe that his soul was not beyond redemption and transformation through grace when he died.  I think the knot in my stomach goes beyond Osama Bin Laden's death and stems from my own sin and filth.  If Bin Laden is beyond redemption, then aren't I beyond redemption, too?  I long for a time and a world where justice is restorative and beautiful, and we speak of it not with sword and battle allegory but words of understanding, forgiveness, and peace.  Justice consumed with grace and motivated by love.

These are the times I wish I could have a sit-down with God and throw my heart at him and cry.  But I know he cries, too, maybe not for the same reasons as me, but for lives and souls lost to violence and hate.