wfn.org | Struggle continues for widow of bombing victim

["NewsDesk" <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

April 1, 2003 News media contact: Tim Tanton7 (615)742-54707 Nashville, Tenn.
10-34-71BP{190}

NOTE: This report is a sidebar to UMNS story #189. Photographs are available.

A UMNS Report
By Tom McAnally*

After her husband died in the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal
Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995, Anne Marshall began the long and
painful journey of putting her life back together.

She tested her own psychological resources, examined her spiritual values and
sought to discern the will of God. As a faithful member and full-time staff
executive in the United Methodist Church, she felt a special need to consider
official teachings that condemn the death penalty.  

Her husband Raymond Johnson was one of the 168 victims, including 19
children, who died in the Oklahoma City bombing. Marshall is a staff member
of the denomination's Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious
Concerns, with offices in New York.

Marshall has shared her personal experiences several times with United
Methodist News Service, but not until now has she revealed publicly that she
was one of 10 people randomly chosen to view the execution of Timothy
McVeigh, the convicted bomber. The execution took place June 11, 2001, in
Terre Haute, Ind.

As Marshall sought to square her own hurt and pain with the position of her
church, she turned to her own Native American heritage for insight and
guidance. She is a member of the Creek nation.

"I consulted ministers of the church but then I went back to who I am as a
native person," she said. "I talked to elders in my community who told me
about our own court and judicial system before the white people came.

"Native people never had to build a prison, I learned," Marshall said.
"People understood that when you broke the law you were punished."

If McVeigh had been native, he would have been expelled from the tribe until
the green corn ceremony of the next year, she said. "It would have been
determined then if he were to die or be welcomed back. It would have been a
community decision." 

She said he could have been welcomed back into the community only if he had
worked to right the wrong, been remorseful, and done what the community
required. And, if he were readmitted into the community, he would have had to
provide for the family of the victim.

"The victim's family would have had a large say," she continued. "If it was
decided he should die, McVeigh would have chosen his executioner and the
method of his death."

The United Methodist Church, in its Social Principles, opposes capital
punishment and urge its elimination from all criminal codes. The Social
Principles are found in the denomination's Book of Discipline and Book of
Resolutions. 

Marshall believes each case should be handled on an individual basis, taking
into consideration the nature of the crime and the attitude of the person who
committed it.

She finds particularly hurtful the fact that Timothy McVeigh never expressed
remorse for his actions and returned, unopened, the letters sent to him by
family members of the victims. 

"He (McVeigh) never really expressed himself to make me feel sorry for him or
question how a society could have let a man like this go astray," she said.
"He was never remorseful. He only spoke of the victims of the bombing as
being 'collateral damage.'"

Sitting a few feet from McVeigh as the lethal injection was administered,
Marshall said she felt no joy or sadness. "I felt no emotion. I saw a person
die who committed an atrocity and he was making it right with the community.
All the time, a line from a song kept going over and over in my mind: 'There
is a balm in Gilead.'" As in the case of all executions, a screen blocked the
inmate from seeing those present.

"World Trade Center families don't have anyone to execute," Marshall
observed, referring to those who lost loved ones in the Sept. 11, 2001,
attack on New York. "The perpetrators who did it are gone. They are dealing
with issues far different than those of us related to the Oklahoma City
bombing. We saw justice being served."

Marshall said some church members are upset with her for not condemning the
execution and forgiving McVeigh. "I have a lot of admiration for people who
can forgive, but I wonder if they really do. Do they really? I can't say up
to this point I can really ever forgive McVeigh. I don't know if we as humans
have that realm. Jesus did. We can give the verbal forgiveness, but deep down
can we really do it? I'm struggling with that still."

Before she dies, Marshall said she hopes she can forgive McVeigh and all the
people involved. "I'm still struggling with it now. I appreciate my
rootedness in the church that has kept me focused on what it means to be a
Christian. I have limitations as a human being.

"I don't think God wanted people to die in the World Trade Center or for
Raymond to die in the Oklahoma City bombing. That was McVeigh's choice, and
we are living with the consequences of that choice. It was never God's plan."

Since that horrible day in 1995, Marshall says she has moved on with her
life. "I must speak about what I believe and my own struggles. It is a
struggle today. I want to be a person of God and do things that God calls me
to do."
#  #  #
*McAnally, former director of United Methodist News Service, resides in
Nashville, Tenn.

*************************************
United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org