Justice in The Here and Now

Posted October 23 at 8:30am

By Devadas Krishnadas (Facebook)

A guilty verdict has been delivered in trial of 6 members including the leader of the City Harvest Church (CHC). We now await the mitigation and sentencing phase which will formally conclude what has already become the longest trial in our modern legal history. What can we learn about ourselves from this trial? What can it tell us about where we may be going next?

First, we have to rationalise why the trial was so protracted. This seems to have had several contributory reasons. One, being that there were 6 accused. Second, the matter at hand was very convoluted. But it was also because the court allowed as much leeway as it could to listen to all arguments and into every corner of the case. This was because, this has not been just a trial against 6 persons but because the accused were religious actors and affiliated to a religious organisations special sensitivity applied to the appearance of the trial. Justice had to be done but more importantly seen to be done.

Second, none of the accused has, even now, admitted guilt. We now seem to find ourselves in an American style legal environment where the first rule of defence is “never plead guilty”. But more insidiously after the verdict the response from Pastor Kong, the most prominent accused, was to appeal to God - “The days and steps ahead are challenging, but with God’s grace and love, I have no fear” is what he is reported to have said. Ordinarily this would be a benign statement but coming from a self-appointed leader of a substantial religious movement we should treat such declarations with more circumspection.

By not acknowledging their guilt even as the evidence against them mounted while insisting that their actions were spiritually pure the 6 accused, most particularly Pastor Kong, have set up a shadow challenge against the supremacy of secular legal justice. By not conceding the error of his actions, he is essentially messaging his followers that while he has been convicted in the court of man, he is innocent in the court of God.

There are several worrying implications. In a multi-cultural and multi-religious society the common denominator can only be secular governance and justice. For that to prevail, all parties must accept its supremacy. Once they do not, then this opens the way for each affiliation to become partisan and particular in its interpretation of right and wrong, not only in spiritual matters, but also in civil and commercial arenas. While Kong and his co-accused have endured the trial they, none of them, have shown themselves ready to accept the verdict even if they are prepared to accept the sentence. This plays powerfully to Biblical narrative of the martyr.

If the members of the CHC do require their leaders to acknowledge their guilt then we could see a situation where the verdict, rather than be seen to be civil justice, is cast as alignment to the divine justice of martyrdom. While we should not make the trial more than it is, except that it actually is. The vital matter at hand is not verdict but the narrative the process is made to support. It must be clearly understood that this was a process of secular justice based on evidence of facts and not a battle between the secular State and a Church or a religion based on testimony of opinions.

If the followers of CHC can accept that narrative then we can be reassured of our future civil harmony. However, if they choose to see matters differently, then this opens the way for religious leaders to limit their obedience to the secular rule of law which would have implications in matters ranging from attitudes to homosexuality, to abortion, women’s rights and mutual acceptance of religious legitimacy.

Thus the ultimate irony of the CHC trial is that the Court may have delivered its verdict but it is the verdict of the followers of CHC that may matter more in the long run.

Source: https://www.facebook.com/1DevadasKrishnadas/posts/466051886889533