Our justice conversation is about justice rooted in love. We believe that without this basis of understanding, actual justice is not possible. Responses that are retributive, or based in punishment, or in an idea of ‘fairness’ which is always from a limited viewpoint, should not be called ‘justice.’ These advance harm and violence and are not the remedy we need for peace in our world and neighborhoods and homes.
Justice is often a cry for some kind of repair when harm has happened. Often the harm is egregious, or so long-sustained that it cannot be truly restored to some previous state of health. What is needed is a righting of the relationship of the stakeholders to each other. With attention to each person’s needs, the parties must share in dignity and collective mourning for what has been lost, and recognize accountability and actions that are needed for healing.
Love cannot exist outside of relationship. When we give attention to each other’s needs, hold each other in dignity, mourn our losses, are accountable for changing our actions, and heal together, it brings us to a space where we also share joy together, and live in community together. This is why love, and only love, is the root of all justice.
Podcasts
The Justice Conversation podcast series brings together people who discuss from the perspective of love and relationship. The hosts are Philipos Hailemichael and Kim Vanderheiden.
Philipos is a resident of the Bay Area in California whose mother tongue language is Tigrinya. His perspective on this project includes the Tigrinya culture and norms where he grew up. Tigrinya (ትግርኛ) is of the Afroasiatic language family. It is commonly spoken in Eritrea and in northern Ethiopia’s Tigray Region.
Kim is from the United States. She started the Justice Conversation project to contribute to a shift in cultural understanding from punitive to relationship-centered justice.
Take in the conversation here on our website, or on our YouTube Channel.
About Matthew
Bill Denham shares his overwhelming grief, his search into the meaning of justice, and the path of restoration in response to the murder of his stepson, Matthew Avery Solomon. Bill’s began sharing his grief through a series of poems, Looking for Matthew, which he recorded, letterpress printed into a hand bound book, and had an regular commercially printed version published by a small press.
When Matthew’s murderers were arrested and the death penalty was on the table for their trial, Bill began a meaningful search into the nature of justice, and the role of restoration, in a new book, What is Justice. We share this book in full here, in these articles.
As of 2024, the death penalty has been dropped due in part to Bill’s adamant refusal to support it as an act of justice for Matthew’s killers. There has recently been an agreement to enter a guilty plea by one individual, and Bill has had the opportunity to have a guided restorative justice conversation with him.
Joining in Conversation
We welcome more voices in the Justice Conversation project. If you would like to help with podcasts, contribute to content, or have another project in mind that you think might belong here, please let us know.
