How do we pay for our crimes?   Is an apology enough?   How contrite do we need to be for it to qualify?   Kanye West seemed to get it right on the fourth or fifth confession.  It took Jay Leno asking Kanye how his deceased mother would feel about his rudeness towards Taylor Swift.  Republican Representative Joe Wilson’s outburst during the President’s address to Congress also raised the issue.   Wilson considered one apology enough.   Now, Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson has offended Republicans by claiming their “very simple” healthcare plan encourages sick people to die quickly.   Grayson insists that he will not apologize for his poster board presentation to the House of Representatives.

These cases are only about words.  What about when lives are wrecked?  Many were outraged by Scotland’s release of the Lockerbie Bomber.   Scenes of his heroic welcome at the airport in Tripoli mocked our efforts to combat global terrorism.  Was too much grace extended to a convicted terrorist dying of cancer?  Why should he be allowed to reconnect with his family in Libya, when his actions separated two hundred seventy families from their loved ones?

Our divided feelings regarding atonement have surfaced just as passionately around Roman Polanski’s extradiction.   The coverage in the Los Angeles Times illustrates the cavernous distance between those who consider the case ancient history and those who find Polanski’s actions still worthy of prosecution and incarceration.   Patrick Goldstein paints Polanski as a victim comparable to Les Miserables’ Jean Valjean, hounded by prosecutors as blind as Javert.   Yet, Steve Lopez reminds us of the sickening details of the case, putting the focus back upon the rape victim.  Megan Daum points out that no matter how tortured Polanski’s personal life has been, it is no substitute for a case that has never been tried, justice never served.   Now, the debate swirling around Polanski has been elevated into yet another symbol of the vast cultural divide in America.   Hollywood defends artists who live above the law, while middle America cries out for justice and equal prosecution.

My partner at Purple State of Mind, John Marks set off an imbroglio by calling for the prosecution of Alan Greenspan rather than Roman Polanski.   He wonders why massive financial crimes aren’t prosecuted with equal diligence as a single sexual assault.   Shouldn’t we truly be outraged by the people who have threatened to bankrupt our nation?    Why is our sense of justice so heightened about sex and so quiet regarding white collar crime?   For Marks, the Polanski case is too much about too little.His critics accuse him of marginalizing rape victims everywhere.

Marks (and perhaps most of Hollywood) has come to see Polanski’s case through the prism of the riveting documentary,Roman Polanski:  Wanted and Desired (edited by the great Joe Bini).  It premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to substantial acclaim, demonstrating how the legal system in Los Angeles got caught up in its own celebrity obsession.   Filmmakers in New York and LA understood how fame can warp the wheels of justice.    Middle America wonders why the Polanski case has been ignored for so many years.   The artistic community wonders why it is being brought up after so long.

The case illustrates the ongoing cultural pull between freedom and responsibility.     Polanski is stand in for the excesses of the 1960s, whether viewed from the murder of his wife by the Manson family to his own rape of a thirteen year old.  No matter how many years Charles Manson serves, Polanski’s wife (and child) will not be coming back.    Polanski’s apology and his victims’ acceptance still doesn’t satisfy those who have also been sexually abused and assaulted.   Polanski may atone for his sins and even go to jail, but such conviction does not automatically cross over into forgiveness and healing.   Our hunger for justice is a noble, God-given desire, worthy of ongoing vigilance.   We long for somebody to make things right.   The Christian community holds up Jesus’ death as the only sufficient coverall, the one for the many.   Yet, our gnawing dissatisfaction remains on this side of paradise.   We cry out for justice, waiting, watching, wondering what will happen to Polanski and to us.