1 John 4:7–21, John 15:1–8
Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. (John 15:6)
There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. (1 John 4:18)
The chief objection I hear to abolition is rooted in consequences, particularly fear of imagined consequences. What will happen if we don’t have police? What will happen if we don’t have prisons? What will happen if we don’t put children in cages and incarcerate migrants? The unspoken bit of these questions is an assumption rooted in fear — and frequently bigotry toward people of color. The objector’s imagination conjures a lawless world full of unrestrained vagabonds and nerdowells. Punishment is the only barrier between us and this chaotic, dangerous world.
The first letter of John says that such a mindset is rooted in fear rather than love. The author urges us to pursue lives rooted in the abiding love of God. This love is the very essence of God, it is who God is. With love grounding our lives and beings, we ought to love one another. Anything that falls short of that mutual love is not of God and it does not come from God.
The carceral system and the police state of the United States of America, whether applied to citizens or non-citizens, is hardly based in love. If perfect love casts out fear, as the author suggests, there is no love at all in such a system. It is entirely based on fear and punishment, precisely the sort of thing Scripture warns us against.
We should be far more afraid of the consequences of failing to abide in the love of God than we are afraid of what a police-free and prison-free world looks like. John’s Gospel makes that clear enough. Affording to John, Jesus claims that God will remove the branches that do not bear the fruit of the love of God. And branches that do not abide in the love described here and in 1 John, Jesus says “such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.” Such divine consequences are a much greater cause of concern than the distorted imaginations that conjure caricatural nightmares of crime and violence as a result of abolition.
If we must talk about the consequences of abolition, however, we should return to 1 John. Here, the author promises that if we love one another that God will live in us and that the love of God will be perfected in us. We should let our imaginations run wild with what that could mean. A world where abolition has succeeded is a world where we love one another, and a world where God will live in us. This world is one of abundance and peace, and what could be a better consequence than that?
Indeed, what will happen if we don’t have police? What will happen if we don’t have prisons?
Wesley Spears-Newsome (he/him/his)is a writer and Baptist pastor in North Carolina. You can find more of his work at wespearsnewsome.com.