Video of Dylann Roof’s Bond Hearing

Listen carefully because friends and family of the murder victims are hard to hear. What you will hear is this. Despite the pain and grief and anger and sorrow, forgiveness is offered to Roof by one person after another. This is how the kingdom comes, unlikely as it seems. This is how evil gets defeated in the trenches. The accused is not given the opportunity for further self-justification for his actions because he doesn’t get to hear hate-filled diatribes from those whose lives are forever changed. Instead, forgiveness and mercy are offered in the midst of unspeakable evil and its aftermath. This is how love triumphs. It’s terribly difficult and utterly breaks the heart. But it is the only way because love and forgiveness and mercy follow the way Christ defeated evil supremely on the cross. God bless these saints. God have mercy on this kid’s soul as well as all those who helped make him who he currently is.