A Public Death – Pre-Easter Meditation

I’ve set a goal to write once every three weeks. This weekend, as Easter approaches, I’m writing two posts. This post won’t be quite as long as my book review post.

Now, I want to focus your mind on a fairly recent public death. We hear about deaths all the same, from movie and TV stars to athletic figures. But it’s rather rare to see a public death, where it really isn’t contested that the person died, and the person died in public.

So, focusing on what a public death would entail and might look like, let’s think about the recent death of Alex Pretti. Before I lose you completely, this isn’t a political point. At the moment, I don’t care which side of the political fence you are on, nor do I care who was right or wrong, etc. I think everyone can agree that Alex Pretti died in public. Nobody disputes the fact that Alex actually died. The death was witnessed. No one has made any claim that he didn’t really die or that he was seen helping others in the following days. The man died, dead, gone from this world, and it happened in public, so there are witnesses.

Alex Pretti died. Now, use your imagination a bit. What would you honestly think if you heard that his closest friends and family were making reports that Alex Pretti was actually alive? Or let’s go further: what if the reports said Alex Pretti came back from the dead? What would you really be thinking? I imagine that I would be highly skeptical. I might think his friends were having an incredibly hard time in grief. I wouldn’t likely really believe it was true.

Now, let’s recall some history of what happened to the man called Jesus the Christ when He died upon a cross. That too was a public death. There were witnesses. The soldiers in charge took steps to make sure Jesus was really dead, gone from this world. Jesus was even placed in a tomb. Jesus died. Jesus really died. He was fully human, and his death was painful. And it was public – there were witnesses.

Yet, incredibly, the closest friends of Jesus claimed he was actually alive a few days later. Also, they actually claimed that he really died and he was raised from the dead. Now, how do you imagine those who heard these reports felt? What would they make these reports of? What could they make of these reports? What kind of reaction do you think these closest friends of Jesus received when sharing such news?

The key core claim of Christianity is that Jesus died on the cross and was raised again to be a bridge between mankind and God. Consider the role of Jesus’s closest friends. I wonder if any of them wondered what they had gotten themselves into. But the thing to note is that Jesus’ closest friends spoke of their experience, even at the risk of persecution. We learn from early writers and Church tradition that all of Jesus’ closest friends faced intense suffering for their faith. Many of them died horrible deaths.¹ But they had an unwavering commitment to spread the good news of reconciliation with God that Jesus desired them to share with others.

Sometimes it’s hard for us to put ourselves back in the times of the Bible. Hence, the focus on a recent public death helps us imagine what it might have been like during the public death of Jesus Christ and in the days that followed.

And focusing on the role of Jesus’ closest friends makes me wonder if I would do the same. Would I be fearful? Would I be unwavering? And what if real persecution came to Christians here in America? Would Christians here, as a group, be found to be unwavering?

Something to think about as Easter approaches.

1. How did the twelve disciples die? – BibleAsk. (2020, November 24). https://bibleask.org/how-did-the-twelve-disciples-die/ Accessed: March 22, 2026 ↩︎