More commentary on death

I always go through internal queasiness whenever there is a high-profile death penalty case. I guess not having very solid opinions on the death penalty generates that uneasiness. If I were the victim of a heinous crime, I would probably think differently, but looking at it from the outside, it's hard for me to imagine how justice works from a supernatural perspective. I guess I understand in my head the idea of there being consequences to action, etc. But do those consequences lead to the final act of taking life? If we were all sinners deserving the full wrath of God, but he relented from not pouring out his wrath so that we could actually discover grace, and so be saved, should not that same principle apply for human justice? After all, our deserving the wrath of God is based on divine justice. I don't know. It's like the old movie line: God will judge what you have done; my job is just to make sure you meet him soon. This concept of non-grace leads to very a-theistic thinking. If God, and the people who follow him, can't give grace, then I want to have nothing to do with him or his people... Stuff like that. Remember the poem that Timothy McVeigh left as his last words? I was deeply affected by the sheer arrogance in it - man raising his fist to heaven and saying I don't need you. Here... I'll quote it:

Invictus
(William Ernest Henley. 1849-–1903)

OUT of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

See what I mean? When you think there is only you, then it's a pretty depressing life. I'm not actually sure where I am going with this. I guess I'm just trying to figure out in my own mind how justice works, and how it relates to mercy and grace.