Grace’s social dimension
by Kazi Joshua

Richard Snyder writes as a mainline Protestant, a seminary dean and professor, but also as one involved in the lives of the incarcerated. From teaching in the Masters program in Sing-Sing, New York, Snyder documents the rampant growth of a desire for revenge against those who have committed "crimes," and reflects on this theologically. His work has implications for our lives: How do we constitute communities that are restorative, healing and just at their core? Echoing Max Weber’s work on the relationship of capitalism and the Protestant ethic, Snyder argues that within the majority Protestant understanding of grace and redemption, there are tendencies which support a punitive view of those "unworthy" of redemption. Grace so understood emphasizes the fall, and does not recognize "creation grace," grace that defines people "[not] by their condition but by their humanity".

The Protestant "individualistic" understanding of grace and redemption with its strong doctrine of the fall provides some of the intellectual framework for the "spirit of punishment" that has pervaded our nation, much like Christianity offered frameworks for such catastrophic events as slavery and the Holocaust. This is why the understanding of grace is an important place to begin.

Grace, Snyder argues, is not only for the worst of us, but for everybody. It is present in all of life. The categories of "fallen" and "redeemed" need not define who a person is, but rather describe where we find ourselves in our journey with God. In using these categories we should seek to "create a response to crime that does not treat criminals as garbage but sees each as a child of God who is beautiful, worthwhile and good in spite of crimes committed." Because grace is for everyone, evangelism must emphasize redemption as a corporate matter. "Redemptive Grace operates in community, through community, and for community. Each person’s redemption is inextricably linked with the redemption and redemptive activity of the community."

This understanding mitigates the "spirit of punishment." Thinking collectively, we realize we are also complicit in what happens in community. We do not just place blame on those who have committed "crimes"; we also question what kind of community we have provided them. By way of alternative Snyder explores models like South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Native American sentencing circles, and U.S. victim-offender reconciliation programs. All of these recognize the difference between "retributive justice" – essentially paying back those who have done wrong, and "restorative justice" – concerned with restoring to relationship those who have committed crimes. Snyder believes that we can also draw from Christian traditions such as forgiveness, incarnation, the Trinity, and covenant as ways of trying to reconfigure our relationships in our community.

He gives real examples of what people are doing: visitation programs, houses of hospitality, advocacy work, job training programs, and economic investments. These raise structural questions about a society that is "tough on crime" and yet cutting away funding for the educational and treatment programs that help people not reoffend. Snyder concludes with a radical call to conversion for all aspects of society: cultural, political and economic. He calls us to turn from a punitive to a healing spirit. The economic systems that leave so many locked in poverty and in neighborhoods of despair have to be rethought if we are serious about addressing the roots of crime. These are not easy questions to address, but the church can be a part of that discussion and action alongside others also struggling to create a new heaven and a new earth.

This is essential reading for all who are serious about crime and punishment questions in our time and indispensable for those working for the abolition of the death penalty or mandatory sentencing, and for all those involved in prison ministries. It comes at a timely point with others like The Executed God, by Mark Lewis Taylor, and Who Owns Death, by Robert Jay Lifton and Greg Mitchell, as part of this larger conversation about truly restorative and just communities.

Events in New York City have shown us on a national scale that the general response to criminal acts is one of vengeance. Hence, we cannot expect national leadership to bring about the changes Snyder advocates. It is up to every reader. "A battle is raging for the soul of our nation … We cannot continue to turn our backs on those who are hungry or thirsty: we cannot continue to lock up those who are oppressed, to ignore the sick, and to close our door to the stranger, or the heart of our nation will shrivel and die of atrophy."

Kazi Joshua is Director of Nurturing the Call, a project that makes graduate theological urban studies through SCUPE available to African-American working pastors, and a member of the pastoral staff at Progressive Community Church on Chicago’s south side.