The Overton Salon

I’ve heard a number of people talk about “justice being done” in regards to the killing of Osama Bin Laden. As I was listening to someone say this on an NPR program the other day, my thoughts wandered to the film “True Grit.” [spoiler alert]

Mattie Ross is a feisty young girl who sets out to capture the man who killed her father, Tom Chaney. After tracking him for days with Rooster and LaBoeuf, she finally has the chance to kill him. And she does. And he falls off the cliff. And she falls back from the power of the gun, down into a hole with snakes, is bit, poisoned, and almost dies. As an audience, you have no time to celebrate his death. It’s completely anti-climactic.

In many ways, this feels similar to the death of Osama bin Laden.

Here’s what we’ve paid so far to kill Osama bin Laden:

• Our way of life as a country has forever changed, in ways we can’t even remember. We live in constant fear of a possible terrorist attack. As a result, our quality of life has decreased.
• We have “spent” over $1 trillion on the wars, some of which my children will be paying for in years to come.
• Thousands of American soldiers have lost their lives 9/11 – almost 6,000 to date.
• Thousands of American soldiers have sustained physical injuries (approximately 32,000). As of the first few months in 2010, 178,000 soldiers had been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury. It is estimated that 30% of all soldiers have developed mental health problems.  This will cost the American public for many years to come in lost wages, productivity, homelessness, medical care, and the loss of the quality of life for all of those soldiers.
• Thousands of Iraqi (8,000-194,000), Pakistani, and Afghan civilians (almost 3,000 killed by pro-government forces alone) have lost their lives.
• One estimate of the financial cost in the search for bin Laden came out today – $3 trillion over the past 15 years.
• Thousands of soldiers lives have been changed in indescribable ways – long-term physical injuries, post-traumatic stress disorder, divorce, night terrors, etc. Thousands of parents, grandparents, children, partners/spouses have lost loved ones physically and emotionally. They bear a burden bigger than any financial or lifestyle burden than those of us who have not suffered those losses will ever bear.

And this is justice? Scripture shows a very different picture of what justice looks like:

1 Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.

2 See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, but the LORD rises upon you and his glory appears over you.

3 Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.

(Isaiah 60)

This is what God says will happen to Israel when they begin to act justly. While not directly applicable to the United States, which is not a theocracy, God’s measure of justice should be our only measure of justice as a church. So it begs the question: Is light shining upon this nation as a result of this action? Are we radiant (v. 5)?

In God’s Kingdom, justice is not an expense. You don’t have to count bodies when Biblical justice occurs. You don’t have to cut needed supports to those in poverty to pay for justice. Justice is the presence of something – rightness, goodness, integrity, fairness. Humans flourish when justice is present.

Looking at what we have so far paid on catching bin Laden, are these things present?

To me, it looks more like the death of Tom Chaney than justice. Yes, he’s dead. But we’re in the snake pit.