According to Reuters, the father of slain American Nick Berg believed his son “would have felt positive, even about his executioners, until the last minute.” “I am sure that he only saw the good in his captors until the last second of his life,” Michael Berg said today in an interview. Well, I guess we’ll never know if that is true, but it is clear that the father sees some good in his son’s executioners.
You’ve got to be kidding me. Talk about the danger of bad theology. This guy is holding on to his naïve belief in the inherent goodness of man even in the midst of his own son’s murder. It is common to hear this type of nonsense spouted from the mouths of a perpetrator’s family and friends – as soon as some rapist or mass murderer gets put behind bars we hear all about what a “good” person they really are – but it doesn’t usually come from the victims side. This is getting crazy. This nation needs a quick education in the reality of sin and the power of evil or we are going to allow evil men like this to walk in and cut our own heads off.
What is the driving force behind this willful blindness? Could it be that we all want to believe the best about other people so that we can believe the best about ourselves? Is pride lurking just below the surface of these inane comments?