Sister Helen Prejean in Denver

Katie D.

February 26, 2011 - 6:42 PM

Last night Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking and The Death of Innocents, spoke at St. Andrew United Methodist Church in Highlands Ranch, Colorado, and I was there to see her.

Sister Helen has become quite a hero of mine. She is an inspiration in her work against the death penalty, as well as being an incredible source of wisdom, humor, and an example of a life lived in accordance with her beliefs. I have had the honor of arranging her past two visits to the University of Oregon, and will do so again this coming October. But for this weekend, I had the pleasure of seeing her speak at my home church in Colorado, surrounded by the congregation I grew up in.

My mother, Jeri Dwyer, is the Outreach Director of St. Andrew. She has heard all my stories about working with Sister Helen, and wanted to bring the power of her message to our church. In addition to speaking at St. Andrew on Friday evening in front of five hundred people, she also ran a seminar for theology students at the University of Denver.

I have seen Sister Helen speak more than ten times in the past two years. She speaks so movingly of her life story and her work for social justice and the "leastest" people in society: those who have been sentenced to death. She is honest and compassionate, and is also funny-inviting her audience to see all sides of the human experience, even in the grimmest of circumstances. Even after hearing all her stories before, I was still deeply moved as she spoke. I watched the people in the crowd react to her presence and to think through the complexities of capital punishment in a new light, and with new feeling.

I was given the great honor of introducing her. After the church choir sang and the pastor, Harvy Martz, introduced me as a young person who had grown up in that congregation, it was my turn to speak. So I told the crowd about my journey into a passion for social justice, and then the story of meeting Sister Helen. I told them all the truth: that she inspired me to further and deepening action for justice in the world, and helped me to believe that my life could make a difference and that our voices matter. As she regularly challenges audiences: this is a democracy, and so if we are silent we become complicit. I told everyone truly that Sister Helen transformed my life and my path. I invited them all to feel the same.

Sister Helen invites us to feel the deep polarization in our own hearts. She invites the natural horror at human suffering caused by crime and criminal action. She demands outrage for the victims, and the families of victims, and invites our collective compassion and support for those who have suffered unfairly through the loss of loved ones. And she challenges us to uphold the dignity of all human life, even human life guilty of horrible crimes. She asks us to see the value and redemptive potential in every human being. She holds that tension of compassion within her heart, and then she works with every bit of her strength to be a faithful witness to each side.

She lives her convictions: every day she is awake to the injustice and suffering of the world. That she does so with empathy and humor and grace is an extraordinary thing.

I am honored to have been present to hear Sister Helen again as she opened new dialogue with the members of my childhood congregation. I am inspired, again, to live in accordance with my own belief in justice and in the need to be a witness to the suffering in the world. I believe our lives matter: that young people can change the world, that those guilty of crimes can live lives of dignity, and that our communities in the world can be united by compassion.

And I feel so lucky to continue this dialogue here in Denver, here on the blog, and back at the University of Oregon.