Is Justice a Political Issue?

[Please note: The following is my opinion on a delicate topic -- detainees in Guantanamo Bay. I believe Christians should be thinking and speaking about this topic, and I offer my opinion here in hopes of fostering and continuing the conversation.]

‘I say to you who hear: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.”

Luke 6:27

Have you ever had you head held under water? I have. It’s terrifying.

I don’t think the kid doing it meant any real harm. He was just roughhousing, but it scared the snot out of me. I panicked, flailing and thrashing as I desperately tried to get to the surface and suck in a breath of air. And from that experience, I learned this: it’s not fun to feel like you’re drowning.

Around that time, I memorized this verse (and, yes, it was an assignment for the Christian school I attended): “Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them.” (Matthew 7:12). Now, I wasn’t a rocket scientist then, and I’m not one now, but I did get the basic idea behind this verse: be nice. And, applied to the experience above, I’d add, don’t hold people underwater. It’s not nice to terrify people.

Another terrifying experience occurred to me when I was older, at the age of twenty-one.

I had become a Christian as I was being treated for depression in a mental hospital. At that time, I gave my life to Christ and then asked permission to depart the unit, having become convinced of the truthfulness of another verse I had memorized as a child: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly.” (Ps. 1:1) Bottom line: I was convinced that I needed to seek Christian counsel, not secular counsel.

Anyhow, after I made my request, two doctors interviewed me and determined that I was ‘psychotic,’ basing their opinions on the fact that I had ‘created’ a religious conversion to deal with my emotional difficulties. They declared that “when I realized that what I believed wasn’t true, I would attempt to kill myself.” And, in all fairness to these doctors, I must admit that believing one can converse with a person who died and was resurrected about 2,000 years ago does seem psychotic, unless it were true. But, regardless, they decided I was psychotic and a danger to myself.

Thus, labeling me psychotic and a ‘danger to myself’, these doctors were within their legal rights to order me to be involuntarily committed to the hospital – for six weeks, and then two months, and then six months, and then a year, and then two years, and every two years after that, This commitment would be reviewed at each of those points, but the only requirement for its continuation was the agreement by any two doctors that I presented – in their opinion – a danger to myself or others.

This was not the terrifying part. Yes, it was scary, but not terrifying. The terrifying part occurred when I received a visit from my lawyer.

He listened to everything I had to say, and then he answered: “Well, Chris, I’m glad to hear you’ve found something that makes you feel better.” (He wasn’t a believer either.) “But, I have to tell you the reality of how things work here. When you appeal this decision, it will be taken before a judge, and the judge is an elected official. If he lets you out and you kill yourself or someone else, then he will lose the next election. If you stay in here until you die, it will cost him nothing.” He paused, and then added, “You’re not getting out of here.”

Then I was terrified. I was terrified by the realization that I could be held against my will, without genuine legal recourse, without justice, subject only to the whims of a couple of other people.

This was another moment when I remembered Matthew 7:12 “Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them,” and I extrapolated this: don’t imprison people and give them no legal recourse. Don’t take away justice. It’s not nice. Give them genuine legal recourse. Give them justice.

Lately I have been thinking a lot about the “detainees” at Guantanamo Bay, and I want to raise my voice in protest.

I happened to catch a radio interview with Lt. Col. Stuart Couch. Couch was assigned to serve as a prosecutor for one of the detainees, but in 2003, he withdrew, because he believed he was asked to use evidence obtained through means of coercive interrogation that violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice. During the radio interview, he described some of these methods, and, I think it’s fair to say, they weren’t ‘nice.’

Couch is a Christian. He argues that his faith in Christ necessitated that he declare his opposition to the way Guantanamo detainees have been held.

Laying aside the use of waterboarding, sensory deprivation, and other forms of ‘enhanced interrogation,’ the indefinite detainment of these people is unconscionable. As human beings, they should treated with dignity and justice, and indefinite detainments provide neither.

There are many mitigating circumstances, I know. And I know I don’t know all the ‘top secret’ info about how bad these guys are, and I know some Christians see these detainments as justified in the light of the greater evils they might prevent. But, my question is, do we, as Christians, really want to be in the business of justifying evils? Are these guys really bad enough that we, Americans, want to be bad guys too? Wouldn’t it be better if we Christians were in the business of crying out for justice?

Something needs to change at Guantanamo, and it is time for Christians to unite their voices in the pursuit of justice.

“I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you.”

Matthew 5:44

- Christian Pilet