Bahamas: Rejecting Capital Punishment

originally published:
24th September 2009

Capital punishment – as lawful edict of the sovereign – continues to rile and roil public opinion in the Bahamas, its region and the world. On the one side are folks like us who abhor the punishment and on the other, there are folks who want vengeance.

There is something suspiciously wrong when the state authority would be seen as pandering to the voices that are loudest, no matter how unreasoning. In this regard, we shall all know soon enough whether the government is prepared to send any one or [for that matter] any number of convicted murderers to a state-sanctioned death.

Such a maneuver – while seemingly popular – can only serve to further coarsen an already brutalized society, a place where more and more Bahamian men, women, boys and girls are experiencing no end of distress. On occasion, this emotion pushes someone or the other to the brink. This brink is that dread place where people either die by their own hands or where they kill others. So when the killing is done by the state, death alone triumphs.

We have said it before and today we repeat – as principle – our complete and utter repudiation of capital punishment as a fit or proper punishment for any human person. Our assurance that life is of God, leaves us with the clearest understanding that vengeance is His, and that – as promised – He will repay.

We also know that we are joined in this principled sentiment by tens of thousands of Christians in this country and untold millions around the world. Some of these fine folk are Methodists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, Roman Catholics and a mighty host of other Trinitarian believers.

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Posted by Gaynor Kuye on 27/09/2009. Filed under Capital Punishment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry