LET US LOVE THEM

Tony Campolo tells about some homeless teenagers from the Philadelphia streets who beat to death a Korean honor student doing graduate work in medicine at the U of PA. His parents came to the U.S. for the trial, and sat silently through his murderers’ entire trial.

At the end, they asked for an opportunity to speak. The guilty verdict came in, and they rose and knelt before the judge. "Before a stunned audience these parents begged ... him to release their son’s murderers to them so that they could give the boys the home and care they had never had. They were Christians, they explained to the judge, and they wanted to show something of the grace they had received from God to those who had done them such grievous evil."