Christians and the Breonna Taylor Tragedy: Do We Care What Words Mean?

 

Some Christian personalities have continued to use the word murder in reference to the Breonna Taylor killing.  Tragic, yes.  Sad, yes.  Painful, yes. Criminal, perhaps.  However, it doesn’t rise to murder.  Consequently, Christians who are claiming it’s murder may want to reframe their thinking and revisit their wording.

The Kentucky murder statute requires that a person must form an intent to cause the death of another person before the state can convict that person of murder.  KRS 507.020.  For an act to be intentional it requires a person have a “conscious objective” to cause the particular result or engage in the particular conduct.  KRS 501.020.  This is the law in Kentucky.

Applying the actual law to the Breonna Taylor case, none of the police officers involved had a “conscious objective” to kill either Breonna Taylor or her boyfriend.  Their objective, manifestly, was to protect themselves.  Arguments about the validity of the warrant, or whether the officers should have fired any shots or as many shots, or that the other officers who got the warrant lied to get it, or that Breonna Taylor didn’t have a gun, or even the heinousness of the outcome don’t have any bearing on the intent of the officers involved.  There has to be evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that the officer whose shot killed her had a conscious objective to kill either the boyfriend or her at some time before the first shot was fired at the officers. In other words, the circumstances, however difficult and even unjust are not how we determine whether a murder occurred. The key feature of a murder is that the killer meant to kill and killed regardless of circumstance.  The shooting in this case was incidental to the reasons the police were there, not the reason they were there.

Perhaps an analogy will help here.  Suppose an ex-boyfriend showed up instead of the police.  The ex-boyfriend isn’t mad at the new boyfriend and is not there to shoot either Breonna or the new boyfriend. He has a gun with him. He just wants to talk, or get back some item that belongs to him, or has some other reason for being there that doesn’t involve intending to kill anyone.  He bangs on the door.  No one answers.  As he bangs on the door a second time it opens and he pushes it only to see new boyfriend standing in the hallway with a gun pointed at him.  A shot is fired and old boyfriend starts shooting and he hits Breonna and kills her.

Is anyone going to say he “murdered” Breonna?  No.  Why not? Because he did not have the conscious objective to kill anyone. He was reacting to circumstances.  One might argue he overreacted or that he reacted negligently. No reasonable person, however, would say he had any objective other than his original reason to be there. The shooting is incidental to his purposes.

Christians who are using the word murder are not merely being sloppy.  This incident was absolutely not a murder. No matter how problematic you believe the circumstances, no matter how heinous you believe the result to be, calling this murder is wrong. Since it is wrong to claim it was murder, you should immediately stop using that word, as the connotation is clear: the police intended to kill her. They did not.

I have not seen one Christian personality who has used the word murder suggest they meant it in some pejorative sense. I have not seen one suggest that they’re saying murder because of the heinousness of the situation. Maybe that’s what they really intend, but I’ve not seen it.  Even if that’s what they mean, we cannot as Christians simply bandy about words incorrectly.  After all, supposedly we believe the Bible’s words are true. We think they mean something specific.  We also assign life altering significance to the words of Scripture.  Why should a watching world care what we say about the Bible or believe what we claim it means when we show ourselves willing to cast aside meaning to suit our own angst or our own agenda?  Does that then mean Christians who are calling this murder are willing to re-invent the words of the Bible to suit their own purposes?  Why should I believe you when you claim otherwise if you aren’t willing to be honest regarding this matter? 

The tragedy of this matter shouldn’t result in dishonesty for the sake of some supposed greater good.  That’s called the ends justifies the means. There is nothing Christian about such an attitude.

Additionally, since it is not murder, it violates the 9^th commandment to keep saying it is.  Doing so is bearing false witness against the police officers.  If you are a Christian referring to Breonna Taylor’s death as murder you should stop right now and you should repent.  You are wrong in what you are doing.

Note, too, the definition of murder asks nothing about how anyone feels about the event.  The law must brutally ignore feelings because too often feelings lead us astray. A prosecutor doesn’t get to say to a jury you should feel so badly for Breonna Taylor that you find the police officer guilty of murder.  We don’t allow this because justice demands reasoned treatment under the law, not vengeance.  Acting on feelings leads to vengeance, not justice.

This leads to the second biblical problem with calling this event a murder.  Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. Romans 12:19 (referring to Leviticus 19:18).  Christians ought not to stir up wrathful and vengeful feelings among others.  Calling Breonna Taylor’s death a murder serves no other purpose, as it is not properly or rightly describing what happened to her. 

The Breonna Taylor situation is sad, tragic, unfortunate, perhaps criminal but it is not murder.  Using this word helps nothing.  Christians, of all people, should be ready to use words carefully and appropriately in order to communicate truth.  If we can’t be counted on to do this, then no one should listen to us.