Meting Vengeance

From State Hwy. 128 near the Colorado River - Utah

But Seeking Justice

Justice isn’t always a joyful occasion.  Sometimes, it is painful and solemn... or it should be.

I hold to the belief that all men are inherently good... or at least they start out that way.  We are the divine offspring.  Long before coming here, we were nurtured with unconditional love and perfect wisdom, reared in infinite mercy and empathy.  We communed with the gods and rejoiced in blessings of everlasting life.

Our earthy probation is one of necessary hardship and trial.  It is the refining fire that allows for true and meaningful change in our quest for exalted perfection.  We are challenged physically and spiritually.  Failure is not just common but required... but sometimes, however, that failure can be so catastrophic, even the heavens weep from a broken heart.

This is how I would sum up the life of Osama Bin Laden.  A life that started with such promise, filled with love and anticipation, only to end a tortured soul twisted by fear and hatred into profound wickedness.

I know there are some who would argue points of ideology to find purpose behind his madness but so polluted his thinking in extremes, he would have murdered the world to save it.  There is no rationale, no reason, no purpose large enough, profound enough to justify the path he took.  While still greater evils have been wrought by the hand of man for the sake of lifeless ideology, his was still a work of evil in the end.

All that said, the Lord’s is a perfect love, an unconditional love.  I have little doubt that Osama was met at the vail with loving arms and tears of joy by the Savior.  For His is a perfect understanding of limitless mercy and love.

Justice required Bin Laden be hunted down and executed for his crimes.  But ours is an imperfect justice.  Civilized society could not do to him what he inflicted on us without losing itself in such wickedness.  His was a merciful death by comparison; a pale and meager form of justice.  True justice, it would seem, is only for the gods.

The celebratory gatherings marking his execution speak not of justice but of vengeance.  There is no reverence for the sanctity of life.  No honoring the victims of his heinous crimes.  No acknowledgment of all those still suffering under the evil he cultivated.  No respect for God’s unconditional love for ALL his children.

I find celebrations commemorating the violent death of anyone, no matter how deserving, distasteful and damaging.  They’re sickly misguided and savage.  To say they are understandable really only acknowledges our ability to identify with the most base of human emotions.  It just goes to show how little we have evolved as a people and as a species. “They” who were so different from us on September 11th, 2001 don’t seem all that much different anymore.

My heart is saddened by todays events but relieved that this particular is no longer left undone.  May it bring comfort to the rational who contemplate and mourn.  May it silence the civilly insane who revel and delight.

“He who seeks vengeance must dig two graves: one for his enemy and one for himself”

~Chinese Proverb