Below are three versions of the Stations of the Cross that were displayed in the Church’s yard Holy Week: Audio, Text, or Video:
Audio & Text: This audio version can be used to listen to while reading along with the text and images immediately below:
The images you will see in these stations of the cross were painted by men on death row in the state of Tennessee. Let’s begin with some thoughts about the project from one of the artists, Derick Quintero:
This piece of art is a commentary on the continuing battle for our collective moral worldview. It is a collaborative effort with several of my fellow artists, all of whom reside on Tennessee’s death row. Not all are Christians or even religious. Several chose to be anonymous. I asked my fellow community members to help create this project to begin a conversation about what Justice looks like.
When Jesus was executed, Justice looked different than it does today. However, Justice today has some of the same components as it did back then. The guilty, as are the innocent, are subjected to this state-sanctioned process. As we understand it, state-sanctioned means that “We the People” — collectively speaking — uphold this system of Justice. So, based upon our support, this system of Justice reflects our community’s sense of morals and values.
One of the biggest issues my sense of the “Christian” world has is dealing with the fact Jesus was not a caucasian. This is also true here on death row, a microcosm of the larger “free-world” community. So we decided not to limit one another’s understanding of Jesus’ death or appearance.
During the two-plus months it took to complete this project, we accepted criticism and positive critique from other non-participating community members. Some were fellow prisoners. Some were religious and secular volunteers. Some were correctional officers. It turned into a true community project.
I do not know how many opinions we changed inside during this project, but the dialogue was open and honest, beyond what even I imagined. Safe, open dialogue is a prerequisite for the community model created on this death row. We invite dialogue from anyone on how to change the paradigms of our collective lives with those that promote healing and reconciliation within our diverse communities.
In the Spirit of Love, Mercy, and Forgiveness,
Derrick Quintero
Derrick died while awaiting the death penalty in Tennessee in 2021.
As of January 1, 2022 2,436 prisoners are on death row.
I would like to challenge us this year when we think of Jesus to think of 2,346 Americans also facing the reality of a death sentence. These stations are designed to reflect that reality… These stations are designed so that we might not escape that reality. That just as our Lord was condemned to die so to are others. Let the voices of those living on death row as well as those fighting to end it wash over you. Let their words lead you into greater understanding. Let their words lead you into a great lament of our time.
I have made no distinction between guilt and innocence in prisoner voices. This is a reminder that after the defeat of death on the cross we are called to a new sort of justice. A reminder that we now come “to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.”
The First Station: Jesus is Condemned to Die.
Jesus stands in the most human of places. He has already experienced profound solidarity with so many on this earth, by being beaten and tortured. Now he is wrongfully condemned to punishment by death. His commitment to entering our lives completely begins its final steps. He has said "yes" to God and placed his life in God's hands. We follow him in this final surrender, and contemplate with reverence each place along the way, as he is broken and given for us.
In 82% of the studies [reviewed], race of the victim was found to influence the likelihood of being charged with capital murder or receiving the death penalty, i.e., those who murdered whites were found more likely to be sentenced to death than those who murdered blacks.”
– United States General Accounting Office, Death Penalty Sentencing, February 1990
The death penalty in America is a “direct descendant of lynching.” Racial terror lynchings gave way to executions in response to criticism that torturing and killing Black people for cheering audiences was undermining America’s image and moral authority on the world stage.
41%
African Americans make up 41% of people on death row and 34% of those executed,17 but only 13% of the population is Black.18
8 in 10
More than 8 in 10 lynchings between 1889 and 1918 and legal executions since 1976 have occurred in the South.19
75%
75% of executions for murder were in cases with white victims.20
44
At least 44 people with intellectual disability were executed before the Supreme Court banned such executions in 2002.23
366
366 people who were children at the time of their offense were executed before such executions were banned in 2005.24
20%
Mental health experts estimate at least 20% of people on death row today have a serious mental illness.25
– The Equal Justice Initiative
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Second Station: Jesus Carries His Cross.
Jesus is made to carry the cross on which he will die. It represents the weight of all our crosses. What he must have felt as he first took it upon his shoulders! With each step he enters more deeply into our human experience. He walks in the path of human misery and suffering, and experiences its crushing weight.
These isolation walls...
The creep
And they crawl.
Lurking for
That single moment of
Mental weakness to befall.
If you become hopeless,
Or spiritually fall
This walls they'll have
A feast for you soul
-Kenneth Reams, Death row prisoner Arkansas
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Third Station: Jesus Falls the First Time.
The weight is unbearable. Jesus falls under it. How could he enter our lives completely without surrendering to the crushing weight of the life of so many on this earth! He lays on the ground and knows the experience of weakness beneath unfair burdens. He feels the powerlessness of wondering if he will ever be able to continue. He is pulled up and made to continue.
On the day I die...
I wonder if anyone will pray to God for me
and ask Him to open the gates for the coming of my soul.
-Kenneth Reams, Death row prisoner Arkansas
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Fourth Station: Jesus Meets his Mother.
Jesus' path takes him to a powerful source of his strength to continue. All his life, his mother had taught him the meaning of the words, “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord.” Now they look into each other's eyes. How pierced-through her heart must be! How pained he must be to see her tears! Now, her grace-filled smile blesses his mission and stirs his heart to its depth. Love and trust in God bind them together.
“A civilized country — and that is what we are supposed to be — should NEVER be in the business of murder. I cannot begin to describe the horror of having my son murdered by the State of Mississippi and to not be able to stop it from happening. I watched as the hearts of my entire family were shattered.
We were all victims, as sure as the family of the murdered girl was.
Except Matt’s murder could have been stopped before it was too late. There are so many cases of innocent people being exonerated in the news, more than 155 from death row alone. I think about how I would have felt if Matt had been exonerated and come home. He can’t do that now, even if we were able to prove his innocence, because you cannot bring someone back from the grave. I want this world to be a better place and there is no room for the death penalty or murder in that better world.”
- Mary Stennett Sellers
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Fifth Station: Simon Helps Jesus Carry His Cross.
Jesus even experiences our struggle to receive help. He is made to experience the poverty of not being able to carry his burden alone. He enters into the experience of all who must depend upon others to survive. He is deprived of the satisfaction of carrying this burden on his own.
“The first time I visited Death Row, I wasn't expecting to meet someone the same age as me... from a neighborhood just like ours coulda been me.”
- Bryan Stevenson, ‘Just Mercy’ (2019).
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Sixth Station: Veronica Wipes Jesus’ Face.
Jesus' journey is at times brutal. He has entered into the terrible experiences of rejection and injustice. He has been whipped and beaten. His face shows the signs of his solidarity with all who have ever suffered injustice and vile, abusive treatment. He encounters a compassionate, loving disciple who wipes the vulgar spit and mocking blood from his face. On her veil, she discovers the image of his face - his gift to her. And, for us to contemplate forever.
“Over the past twelve months, I have researched and compared housing policies for death-sentenced and non-death sentenced prisoners throughout the United States. I chose this topic because the death penalty and circumstances on death row have had my interest for many years. I am from the Netherlands, where the death penalty is forbidden by Protocol No. 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The use of prolonged and indefinite solitary confinement in European prisons has mostly been banned as well. My seven-year friendship with Clinton Young, a death-sentenced individual in Texas, motivated me to move to Texas to study at the University of Texas School of Law and become an attorney, to help those on death row, and to research conditions on death row. Countless times I visited death-sentenced prisoners in the Polunsky Unit in Livingston, Texas and observed the devastating effects of indefinite solitary confinement on death-sentenced prisoners, their families, and their friends. These prisoners are confined to a small cell for at least twenty-two hours a day and unable to hug their loved ones for years. These confinement conditions add inhumane treatment to the most severe and irreversible punishment that exists. “ – Merel Pointer
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Seventh Station: Jesus Falls the Second Time.
Even with help, Jesus stumbles and falls to the ground. In deep exhaustion he stares at the earth beneath him. “Remember, you are dust and to dust you will return.” He has seen death before. Now he can feel the profound weakness of disability and disease and aging itself, there on his knees, under the weight of his cross.
On the day I die...
I wonder if anyone will pray to God for me
and ask Him to open the gates for the coming of my soul.
-Kenneth Reams, Death row prisoner Arkansas
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Eighth Station: Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem.
The women of Jerusalem, and their children, come out to comfort and thank him. They had seen his compassion and welcomed his words of healing and freedom. He had broken all kinds of social and religious conventions to connect with them. Now they are here to support him. He feels their grief. He suffers, knowing he can't remain to help them more in this life. He knows the mystery of facing the separation of death.
“Our direct experiences with the criminal justice system and struggling with grief have led us all to the same conclusion: Connecticut’s death penalty fails victims’ families…. In Connecticut, the death penalty is a false promise that goes unfulfilled, leaving victims’ families frustrated and angry after years of fighting the legal system. And as the state hangs onto this broken system, it wastes millions of dollars that could go toward much-needed victims’ services.” - A letter signed by 179 Families of Murder Victims sent to the Connecticut Legislature
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Ninth Station: Jesus Falls the Third Time.
This last fall is devastating. Jesus can barely proceed to the end. Summoning all this remaining strength, supported by his inner trust in God, Jesus collapses under the weight of the cross. His executioners look at him as a broken man, pathetic yet paying a price he deserves. They help him up so he can make it up the hill of crucifixion.
On the day I die...
I wonder if anyone will pray to God for me
and ask Him to open the gates for the coming of my soul.
-Kenneth Reams, Death row prisoner Arkansas
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Tenth Station: Jesus is Stripped.
Part of the indignity is to be crucified naked. Jesus is completely stripped of any pride. The wounds on his back are torn open again. He experiences the ultimate vulnerability of the defenseless. No shield or security protects him. As they stare at him, his eyes turn to heaven.
Of the 185 death row exonerations from the modern era 100 Black people were exonerated.
At least 18 people have been executed despite serious doubts about their guilt.
Official misconduct is the leading cause of wrongful conviction.
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Eleventh Station: Jesus is Nailed to the Cross.
Huge nails are hammered through his hands and feet to fix him on the cross. He is bleeding much more seriously now. As the cross is lifted up, the weight of his life hangs on those nails. Every time he struggles to pull himself up to breathe, his ability to cling to life slips away.
October 28, 2021. Oklahoma. John Marion Grant. (Lethal Injection). After the first drug was administered (midazolam), Mr. Grant convulsed and vomited for several minutes, leading members of the execution team to wipe the vomit from his face and neck. Associated Press media witness Sean Murphy said that “Grant’s body shook and jerked nearly two dozen times before vomit spurted from his mouth and spilled down his neck.”[79] Prior to the execution, Mr. Grant’s legal team (along with attorneys for some two-dozen other Oklahoma death row inmates) had argued that the state’s three-drug lethal injection protocol would cause unnecessary and excruciating pain. Said Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, “Oklahoma knew full well that this was well within the realm of possible outcomes in a midazolam execution. It didn’t care … and the Supreme Court apparently didn’t either.”[80]
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Twelfth Station: Jesus Dies on the Cross.
Between two criminals, a mocking title above his head, with only Mary and John and Mary Magdalene to support him, Jesus surrenders his last breath: “Into your hands I commend my spirit.”
The Names of those executed in the united States in 2021
Lisa Marie Montgomery
Corey Johnson
Dustin Juhn Higgins
Quintin Phillippe Jones
John William Hummel
Rick Allan Rhoades
Ernest Lee Johnson
Willie B Smtih III
John Marion Grant
David Neal Cox Sr.
Bigler Jobe Stouffer II
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Thirteenth Station: Jesus is Taken Down from the Cross.
What tender mourning! Jesus' lifeless body lays in his mother's arms. He has truly died. A profound sacrifice, complete.
“The death penalty is not about whether people deserve to die for the crimes they commit. The real question of capital punishment in this country is, Do we deserve to kill?” – Bryan Stevenson<
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
The Fourteenth Station: Jesus is Laid in the Tomb.
They take the body of Jesus to its resting place. The huge stone over the tomb is the final sign of the permanence of death. In this final act of surrender, who would have imagined this tomb would soon be empty or that Jesus would show himself alive to his disciples, or that they would recognize him in the breaking of bread? Oh, that our hearts might burn within us, as we realize how he had to suffer and die so as to enter into his glory, for us.
Executions scheduled for the month of April
April 21st Oscar Franklin Smith TN
April 21st Carl Wayne Buntinon, TX
April 27th Melissa Lucio, TX
All: We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you. Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.
Video Version: This option is inclusive of Audio Text, Station Images and Music: