RENNY CUSHING
JOURNEY
OF HOPE...
from violence to healing™
Journey Participant:
TENNESSEE, MISSOURI, NORTH CAROLINA
RENNY
IS THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF MURDER VICTIMS FAMILIES FOR RECONCILIATION
"A man come up to me after my father was murdered and said, "I hope they fry those people. I hope they fry them so you and your family can get some peace." I know that man meant to comfort me, but it was the most horrible thing he could possibly have said.
Before my father's murder I had evolved a set of values that included a respect for life and an opposition to the death penalty. For me to change my beliefs because my father was murdered would only give more power to his killers, for they would then take not only his life but his main legacy to me: the values he instilled.
The same is true for society. If we let murderers turn us to murder, we give them too much power. They succeed in bringing us to their way of thinking and acting, and we become what we say we abhor."
Renny Cushing
Hampton, New Hampshire
Profile:
Renny Cushing's father, Robert, was killed by two shotgun blasts fired by a stranger through the family's front screen door in 1988.
"I get sick when death penalty advocates self-righteously prescribe execution to treat the wounds we live with after homicide," Renny says. "Those who hold out an event ---execution--- as the solution to pain have no understanding of healing. Healing is a process, not an event."
A recent two-term member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives, Renny sponsored legislation to abolish the death penalty in 1998. He now serves as MVFR's Executive Director.
Reprinted with permission from Not In Our Name: Murder Victims Families Speak Out Against the Death Penalty, a publication of Murder Victims Families For Reconciliation, Barbara Hood & Rachel King, Editors; MVFR
THE JOURNEY'S FAVORITE RENNY SITES:
POSTER BOY FOR ABOLITION -MCVEIGH
REMARKS MADE BY REP. ROBERT RENNY CUSHING ON HOUSE BILL 1025
HOMICIDE SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT AGAINST THE DEATH PENALTY
A LONG HEALING PROCESS: Murder victims' families describe their struggle to rebuild lives: by Stephen Gawlik
A DIFFERENT LOOK AT THE DEATH PENALTY
AN INTERVIEW WITH RENNY CUSHING (AUDIO) WITH AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
DEATH PENALTY ACTIVISM BRINGING FAITH AND CREATIVITY TO THE STRUGGLE BY JOE WAKELEE-LYNCH
Bill and Renny march together in downtown Raleigh, North
Carolina