Should you watch Nidal Hassan's execution?

Welcome to Theology Thursday! Theology is the study of God, his relation to the world, and our relation to him; it is "faith seeking understanding." I hope these newsletters help enhance your faith and deepen your love for God and his people, the church.

Today's question:
Should you watch Nidal Hassan's execution?

Pastor Brady's thoughts:
This is not an argument for or against the death penalty. I have opinions on that, but they aren’t necessary to the points I want to make today.

Nidal Hassan killed 13 people and injured 32 more in a mass shooting event at Fort Hood in Texas in 2009. For his crimes, he was sentenced to death in 2013. His execution date is currently set for December 3rd of this year. He is to die by firing squad, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth made news a few days ago by stating that the execution would be livestreamed for public viewing.

“We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it - that it’s public - because people need to understand that there are serious consequences for these types of things,” Hegseth said. (There has since been some reporting that President Trump may decide that it won’t be made available to the public - time will tell.)

If the execution is livestreamed, should you watch it? Should you want to?

I want to argue that, as Christians, we should not watch it. Not because we should feel sympathy for Hasan at the expense of his victims (though sympathy for his soul is appropriate), not because justice is unimportant, and not because we should pretend that evil has no consequences. Rather, I believe there are good biblical reasons to resist turning a human death into a public spectacle.

First, we should ask what watching would accomplish. We are told that making the execution public will demonstrate that serious crimes have serious consequences. But do we really need to see someone shot to understand that murder is evil, that violence has consequences, or that justice matters? We already know what Hasan did. We know the lives that were lost and the families that were devastated. Watching his final moments will not restore those lives or heal those wounds. It will not make us more informed about the crime itself. What, then, are we hoping to get out of watching?

Perhaps we want to see justice carried out. Perhaps we feel that someone who committed such terrible acts deserves to suffer. Perhaps we are simply curious. Whatever our motivation, we should be honest about it. There is a difference between wanting justice and wanting to watch someone die. The first is a serious moral concern; the second is about satisfying some base desire for bloodlust. Not Christlike, not healthy.

Second, scripture calls us to treat even those who have done terrible things as human beings made in the image of God. Genesis 1:27 tells us that humanity is created in God’s image. That truth is not negated by someone’s actions, even atrocious actions. Hasan’s actions were horrific, and he must be held accountable for them. But he remains a human being, not merely a monster whose suffering we are free to consume as entertainment.

Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:44 to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. That command is difficult enough when we are dealing with someone who has committed ordinary wrongs. It becomes much more difficult when we consider someone responsible for mass murder. But that is precisely why the command matters. Christian love is not reserved for people we find sympathetic. We are not asked to excuse evil or abandon justice, but we are required to refuse to let another person’s evil determine the condition of our own hearts.

We should be especially wary of anything that encourages us to take pleasure in another person’s suffering. Proverbs 24:17 says, “Do not rejoice when your enemy falls.” If we find ourselves eagerly anticipating the moment someone dies, we should ask whether we are pursuing justice or indulging vengeance.

Third, we should consider what kind of people we are becoming. Every time we choose what to watch, we make a small decision about what deserves our attention. We can become accustomed to violence, detached from suffering, and entertained by things that ought to grieve us. A livestreamed execution would bring a state-sanctioned killing directly into our homes, available for viewing alongside news clips, sports, and social media. The fact that something is available does not mean it is good for us to watch.

Philippians 4:8 instructs Christians to dwell on what is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, and commendable. This does not mean we must avoid every painful reality or turn away from injustice. Sometimes faithfulness requires looking directly at suffering. But we should distinguish between witnessing suffering because doing so helps us understand, serve, or seek justice, and watching because we want to see the moment another person dies. Those are not the same thing.

Finally, we must remember the victims. Thirteen people were killed at Fort Hood. Thirty-two others were injured. Their lives and suffering deserve our attention. So do their families, who have lived with the consequences of that day for years. We honor them by remembering who they were, caring for those who continue to grieve, and taking violence seriously. We do not need to watch their killer die in order to prove that we care about what happened to them.

Christians should be people who hunger for justice while resisting vengeance, who recognize evil without surrendering to hatred, and who protect the dignity of human life even when that dignity is difficult to acknowledge. We can believe that a person deserves punishment without believing that his death should become a public event for our consumption.

Hassan’s impending death - like his actions - should grieve us, not thrill or titillate us. God wants all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (1st Timothy 2:4). To the extent that we believe someone hasn’t, our emotion should be sorrow, even if we believe they are rightly experiencing the consequences of their decisions.

The part of us that glees when we see someone get their comeuppance is not godly, who enjoys no such thing. ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. - Ezekiel 33:11

When we want people to get what they deserve, we must remember that Jesus died so we - you and me - won’t get what we deserve.

So, if the execution is livestreamed, I encourage you not to watch it. Christians’ response to evil is part of our faith witness. We cannot control every act of injustice or violence in this world, but we can choose what we celebrate, what we consume, and what we allow to form us.

If our goal is Christlikeness, does watching a man be gunned down to the death move us toward that goal?

I do not believe it does.

Related Resource
I highly recommend that you watch Gavin Ortlund's video on this question. He goes into more detail than I do, and I find his argument persuasive.

TO KNOW GOD AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN!
- Pastor Brady

Have a question for Theology Thursday? Send an email to office@minierchristian.org and we'll respond, or we'll include in a future Theology Thursday Buffet.