bin Laden, War and Hell

Last night Jeff looked at me and said, "I think I just saw something on MSN that said Osama bin Laden is dead." We were both shocked and waited up for the announcement, and watched in rapt attention as the President explained the events of the day.

It's times like these that I like not having a television, because I knew that TV's everywhere would be showing, "the reaction," and I knew I wanted time for my own reaction to develop without anyone showing me the right way to feel.

My reaction has been surprisingly slow to develop, and to be honest I'm still not sure how I feel.

I was struck by reading Rachel Held Evans' blog on the subject, wherein she made the statement, "Trying to keep in mind that how I respond to the death of my enemies says as much about me as it does about my enemies."

Here are some of my current thoughts:

• Relief is natural and acceptable. I liken this to women who are abused by a partner. They may leave, but there is always a nagging fear that he will find them or get to them somehow. They often feel guilty for the feeling of relief they have if he dies. I think it's perfectly fine, and different than rejoicing in someone's death.
• Our President and military have an extremely difficult job, making decisions about the use of force to protect our country and putting themselves in harms way to carry out those decisions. They have worked so hard at this for so long and I think it's right for them (and previous presidents who worked toward this goal) to feel proud that they have succeeded in their goal after a whole lot of sacrifice on their part.
• My questions about God and Hell have come into greater focus. It's one thing to ask, "Would God send this nice unbelieving person to Hell just for being wrong about Jesus?" and another thing entirely to ask the same question about bin Laden. I still don't know what I believe about Hell.
• I still have a very uneasy relationship with violence. It appears that this was a near-perfect operation with very little "collateral damage," (although I'm still haunted by the statement I read in one article that one woman was killed when she was used as a human shield.) but I still don't know my personal conviction about doing violence to another person. It's a very difficult question.
• I'm uncomfortable with the idea of celebrating someone's death.