Religion

Four years after the racially motivated murders of nine African-American parishioners at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina on June 17, 2015, a new book by Charleston Post and Courier reporter Jennifer Berry Hawes explores the aftermath of the killings and the extraordinary narrative of grace and forgiveness it produced. As a reporter for the Post and Courier, Hawes covered the story of white supremacist Dylann Roof’s murder of the churchgoers and the court proceedings that led to his death sentence. In Grace Will Lead Us Home, released on June 4, 2019, Hawes examines the continuing impact of the murders on the victims’ families, the Charleston community, and the nation. Her book describes the murders within the historical context of race relations in South Carolina, including Charleston’s history of slavery and Jim Crow, and the debates spawned by the shooting about issues such as the display of the Confederate flag. Through interviews with survivors and survivors and victims’ family members, she explores the role of forgiveness in the AME Church and the family divisions that resulted from the murders. She also addresses the ways in which Roof’s capital trial further traumatized those affected by the shooting.

Hawes was part of the Post and Courier reporting team that won the Pulitzer Prize and the Polk Award for its 2014 investigative series on domestic violence, Till Death Do Us Part, and was a 2019 Pulitzer finalist for a series of articles, An Undying Mystery, on the racial injustice that led to South Carolina’s wrongful execution of 14-year-old George Stinney for the deaths of two white girls. In Grace Will Lead Me Home, she “wanted to provide people with a more complex, better understanding of what happened in Charleston.” “The narrative of forgiveness” that emerged from the statements by victims’ family members at Roof’s bond hearing was “an absolutely beautiful, inspiring moment [that] came to define this tragedy,” she said. But in the months and years that followed, “the lives of the people who were most directly affected were changed in so many ways.” Interviewed by NPR’s Joshua Johnson, Hawes described the family members’ statements of forgiveness less as sympathy for Roof than as healing for them. “It’s to keep hate from corroding the soul. It’s to keep me from drowning in malice. … The whole idea was that this is something I can do for myself so that I can move on as a human being. And for people who are Christians, it’s to move toward God and to move forward in their faith,” she said.

In its review of Grace Will Lead Me Home, The New York Times says, Hawes’s effort “to write as comprehensive an account as possible [of the impact of the killings] largely succeeds — if sacrificing, invariably, some depth for breadth. Still, she lands the book with moral force and great feeling, writing about the soil that could produce both the Emanuel Nine and a Dylann Roof.” Kirkus Reviews described the book as “[a]t once horrifying and inspiring, engaging and thought-provoking” and called it “a definitive must-read about the Charleston tragedy.”

The Charleston tragedy and writing the book caused Hawes to rethink how mass violence affects society. In an interview with MacMillan Library, she said: “I have since come to think of mass shootings as akin to tossing a rock into a pond. The initial impact disrupts the surface in obvious ways. But then ripple upon ripple of disruption spreads from that impact. This is what happens after these events, and happened here, from divisions among families and the church to divisions within families grappling with so much pain.” She has noticed hopeful developments since the shooting, such as joint Bible studies that bring together people of different races and police efforts to engage with the community. On the other hand, she says, “our legislators have failed so far to pass meaningful policy changes needed to address the enormous racial disparities that persist here in everything from education to housing to healthcare.” As a result, “the wounds of slavery and Jim Crow remain unhealed.”

A Tennessee murder victim’s daughter is asking Governor Bill Lee to honor their shared faith by sparing the life of her mother’s killer. In what they describe as an “exceptional” clemency plea, lawyers for Tennessee death-row prisoner Don Johnson (pictured) write that Cynthia Vaughn, the daughter of Connie Johnson, has requested a meeting with Gov. Lee to tell him her story of “Christian forgiveness” and ask that he commute Johnson’s sentence to life without parole. The clemency petition describes such a request as extremely rare, saying “[w]e know of only one other case in the history of the State of Tennessee in which the child of the ultimate victim has begged the Governor for mercy for the murderer – and in that case clemency was granted to Gaile Owens.” Johnson’s clemency petition also stresses his remorse and redemption, explaining that he has become an Ordained Elder in the Seventh Day Adventist Church and now ministers to his fellow prisoners. Vaughn and Johnson’s lawyers hope his story of Christian redemption will be of particular interest to Gov. Lee, whose campaign for governor in 2018 repeatedly emphasized his Christian faith.

In a letter to Governor Lee that is excerpted in the petition, Vaughn describes her change of heart about Johnson. For most of her life, she supported his execution, publicly saying, “I want the freak to burn.” However, in 2012, she sought a meeting with Johnson in prison to tell him about the pain he had caused her. “After I was finished telling him about all the years of pain and agony he had caused, I sat down and heard a voice. The voice told me, ‘That’s it, let it go.’ The next thing that came out of my mouth changed my life forever. I looked at him, told him I couldn't keep hating him because it was doing nothing but killing me instead of him, and then I said, ‘I forgive you.’” Forgiving Johnson, she said, has freed her from her anger and allowed her to live her life more fully. “Letting go of anger has let me love more,” she wrote.

Johnson’s religious conversion is the subject of much of the clemency petition and includes numerous testimonials about the positive effect he has had on other prisoners. It also details his personal journey from the routine beatings and psychological abuse he endured from his father and in the juvenile justice system to what the petition characterizes as his religious redemption. "What is most remarkable about Don Johnson’s life story is not that he ended up on death row following a loveless and hate filled childhood, it is that he overcame that childhood to become the man of God he is today," his petition states. Prison ministers and volunteers wrote in support of clemency, describing Johnson’s remorse and his impact on the lives of others. “Don has asked for forgiveness of his sins and crimes he committed years ago and by the grace of God has become a new person in Christ,” wrote Linda Faulk, a prison volunteer who has known him since 2004. “Donnie is no ordinary person and he has unusual perceptivity. I am aware that the prison uses his talents as a counselor and his unit has one of the best behavioral records in the State of Tennessee. Many people rejoice that he has served so well in spite of his environmental circumstances,” said Dr. John L. DuBosque, a visitor and telephone advisor of Johnson’s since 1998. Johnson’s petition concludes with a plea for a grant of mercy by the governor: “Cynthia Vaughn, the person with the greatest claim on his life, deserves to have her forgiveness honored. She should not have her own healing journey ended with an unnecessary and unwanted execution. Don Johnson should not have his journey from the darkness into the light ended in the death chamber.”

The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency for Patrick Murphy (pictured) on March 27, 2019, moving the state one step closer to executing him on March 28 for a murder he neither committed nor intended to commit nor was present when it occurred. Murphy was convicted under the state’s “Law of Parties,” which allows defendants to be sentenced to death based upon the actions and intent of others, if the defendant played even a small role in a crime that resulted in someone’s death. Critics of the law argue that it violates the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1982 constitutional prohibition against executing a person who did not kill or intend that a killing take place and was a minor participant in an offense that resulted in a killing. Murphy was one of the “Texas 7,” a group of prisoners who escaped from prison in 2000. Days after their escape, the men planned to rob a sporting goods store, but Murphy told the group’s leader, George Rivas, that he did not want to participate in the robbery. Murphy waited outside the store in a truck, radioed the others when he saw police arriving, and drove away from the store to a nearby apartment complex. After he left, Officer Aubrey Hawkins was killed in a shootout with the other men.

In 1982, in Enmund v. Florida, the U.S. Supreme Court wrote that “the death penalty … is an excessive penalty for the robber who, as such, does not take human life.” The Court ruled that the focus of a capital punishment trial must be on the culpability of the defendant for his own acts, “not on that of those who committed the robbery and shot the victims.” Murphy’s court-appointed trial lawyer failed to object to the capital charges against him and his state-appointed post-conviction lawyer failed to raise trial counsel’s ineffectiveness, barring the issue from federal review. Murphy’s current lawyers asked the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to reopen his case to consider the issue, but the court denied that request on March 25. They also sought clemency from the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles. However, the Board rejected that request and an alternative request for a temporary reprieve until the state legislature acts on pending legislation that would eliminate the death penalty for people convicted under the law of parties. In a statement, his attorneys David Dow and Jeff Newberry said, “It is unconscionable that Patrick Murphy may be executed for a murder he did not commit that resulted from a robbery in which he did not participate, at the exact moment when lawmakers are considering whether anyone possibly convicted under Section 7.02(b) of the Texas Penal Code should be eligible for the death penalty.” Following the Board’s action, Murphy’s lawyer’s submitted a request for a one-time 30-day reprieve from Governor Greg Abbott “so that he is not executed before additional legislation is passed that would [make] clear convictions obtained in trials identical to his are not eligible for a sentence of death.” While that bill would not be retroactive to Murphy’s case, his lawyers wrote, there is “a substantial possibility” that if the bill passes, the state courts “would hold Mr. Murphy’s death sentence is unconstitutional.”

Murphy also has filed motions in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in which his attorneys argue that Texas is violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by refusing to allow Murphy’s Buddhist spiritual advisor to be present in the execution chamber instead of a Christian or Muslim chaplain. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice employs Christian and Muslim chaplains, who are allowed to be present in the execution chamber, but does not allow chaplains of other faiths, saying that they present a security risk because they are not employees. “A law or policy that is not neutral between religions, like TDCJ’s policy, is inherently suspect and strict scrutiny must be applied when determining whether the policy violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause,” Murphy’s attorneys wrote. A similar claim was raised before the Alabama execution of Domineque Ray, a Muslim prisoner who was not allowed to have his imam present at his execution. The state court denied his motion on March 25 and the federal court followed suit on March 27, both saying his claim was untimely filed. [UPDATE: On March 28, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court granted Murphy a stay of execution “pending the timely filing and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari unless the State permits Murphy’s Buddhist spiritual advisor or another Buddhist reverend of the State’s choosing to accompany Murphy in the execution chamber during the execution.”]

The U.S. Supreme Court has found itself in the crossfire of harsh criticism from across the political spectrum after its intervention in a death penalty case allowed Alabama to execute a Muslim prisoner without providing him access to a religious adviser. Evangelical Christians and Catholic Bishops joined editorial boards and commentators from the New York Times to the National Review in condemning the Court’s 5-4 decision permitting the execution of Domineque Ray (pictured) on February 7, 2019. Los Angeles Times deputy editorial page editor Jon Healey wrote: “If you need a rabbi, an imam or other non-Christian spiritual advisor to accompany you into the death chamber in Alabama, God help you. Because the U.S. Supreme Court won’t.” Libertarian professor Ilya Somin, of the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School, called the decision a “grave injustice” and the conservative National Review headlined a column by its senior writer David French, “The Supreme Court Upholds a Grave Violation of the First Amendment.”

Alabama scheduled Ray’s execution on November 6. Undisclosed to Ray and the other death-row prisoners, Alabama’s secret execution protocol mandated that a Christian chaplain—and no other religious adviser—be present in the execution chamber. Ray sought to be provided the same access to religious comfort that the state afforded Christian prisoners, and requested that his imam be allowed in the execution chamber. The state denied his request on January 23, 2019, saying that the chaplain was allowed in the chamber because he was a trained employee of the Department of Corrections, but an untrained volunteer imam would present security concerns. Five days later, Ray sought a stay of execution alleging that Alabama’s policy violated his First Amendment right to free exercise of religion. A federal appeals court granted a stay to allow briefing on the issue, but the U.S. Supreme Court, in a contentious 5-4 decision, reversed the decision. In a dissent joined by Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, and Sotomayor, Justice Elena Kagan wrote, “Under that policy, a Christian prisoner may have a minister of his own faith accompany him into the execution chamber to say his last rites. But if an inmate practices a different religion — whether Islam, Judaism, or any other — he may not die with a minister of his own faith by his side. That treatment goes against the Establishment Clause’s core principle of denominational neutrality.”

Christian leaders raised concerns about the decision’s disregard of human dignity and its broader impact on religious liberty. In a news release issued under the heading “U.S. Bishops’ Chairmen Condemn Decision Preventing Muslim Man from Receiving Appropriate Spiritual Care at Execution,” the chairs of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops committees for Religious Liberty and for Domestic Justice and Human Development called the death penalty itself “an affront to human dignity.” The statement said “Mr. Ray bore the further indignity of being refused spiritual care in his last moments of life.” The committee chairs—Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, and Bishop Frank J. Dewane of Venice, Florida—wrote: “This unjust treatment is disturbing to people of all faiths, whether Muslim, Christian, Jewish, or otherwise. People deserve to be accompanied in death by someone who shares their faith. It is especially important that we respect this right for religious minorities.” In an op-ed for The New York Times, Alan Cross, a pastor and missional strategist with the Montgomery Baptist Association, wrote, “I am not a Muslim. I am an evangelical Christian minister in Alabama. But my religious freedom — everyone’s religious freedom — took a hit when my state decided that instead of slowing down to accommodate religious difference, the execution, which is final and irrevocable, had to go on as scheduled.” Pastor Cross stressed the value of religious diversity, saying “The solution to diversity is not to eliminate religious difference, but rather to work together to be fully who we are, to cultivate a society where religious belief is recognized and accommodated. Mr. Ray’s religious freedom mattered as much as anyone else’s. That freedom is part of what makes America great. When it is lost, it is replaced by a sterility and silence that will ultimately drive us apart.” In its own editorial, the New York Times editorial board called the Supreme Court ruling a “moral failure” that diminished Muslims and compounded the indignity of its prior acquiescence in the travel ban imposed by the Trump administration.