Between July 1963 and October 1965, Ian Brady and his girlfriend Myra Hindley raped and murdered five children, the youngest of whom was 10, the oldest of whom was 17. The whole country was, rightly, sickened by these horrendous crimes and the names and images of the Moors Murderers as they were known became synonymous with ultimate evil. Yet, for some reason, Hindley was more villified than Brady and it's suggested that this is because she was a woman. It's as if we expect men to be aggressive, even violent, so we can comprehend the idea of a male child-killer even if we don't like it. But women are supposed to be nurturing, maternal, so for a woman to kill a child is doubly horrific, the ultimate sin. Only this, it is thought, can explain the irrational, almost hysterical level of hatred that the British public felt - and indeed continue to feel - towards Hindley.

When she died in November 2002, the headline of the Sun was something like "May she rot in hell". This echoed the headline of the first ever edition of the Daily Star on 2nd November 1978 which was about Hindley and which inspired the song Mother Earth by the anarchist punk band Crass which we were heard a few moments ago. Like many punk and Goth bands, Crass were quite violently anti-religion, particularly Christianity, but I agree wholeheartedly with what they say in this song. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that it was a prophetic critique of the attitude of some Christians to Hindley in particular and to 'sinners' in general and that's what I would like to explore tonight...

The song says:
It's Myra Hindley on the cover,
Your very own sweet anti-mother.
There she is on the pages of The Star,
I bet that's where you wish you were?
Let her rot in hell is what you said,
Let her rot, let her starve, you'd see her dead...
You say you can't bear the thought of what she did,
But you'd do it to her, you'd see her dead.
So, tell me, what's the difference between her and you?
You say that you would kill her, well, what else would you do?
You goodly christian people, with your sickly mask of love,
Would tear that woman limb from limb, you'd never get enough.

Now that may be a bit of an exaggeration. I suspect that the kind of people who would literally kill a Hindley or any other paedophile if they could get their hands on them are unlikely to be `real' or practising Christians. Of course, I'm aware of the existence of the Ku Klux Klan and other people for whom lynch mobs and love your neighbour are not incompatible, so there are people to whom Crass's accusation applies without qualification. But clearly, most of the people in our churches and Christian unions would neither endorse any kind of vigilante action nor indulge in it, even if they knew they could get away with it; if they were alone in the proverbial locked room with Hindley...

But I'm sure many `genuine' Christians would rather have seen Hindley executed than living out the rest of her natural life at the taxpayers expense. Now I happen to be against the death penalty in any situation but that is not my point here. What concerns me is the idea of Christians harbouring a lust for vengeance in their hearts and thinking that that's okay. And someone who opposes capital punishment could be just as guilty of that...
In our first reading, Saint Paul said `Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, `Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord'. Now I believe that eventually every man and woman who has ever lived will stand before God and give an account of their life, be judged, and I guess that that is not going to be a pleasant experience for someone like Myra Hindley or Adolf Hitler assuming, of course, that they died unrepentant. (Now, clearly, only God knows the secrets of people's hearts but I believe that there is some evidence to suggest that Hindley's alleged repentance was a ploy rather than a genuine conversion).

But the point is, if our response to someone like Myra Hindley is to rub our hands with glee and say `Well, I don't have to do anything to you cos when God gets his hands on you he's really going to make you suffer' ? well, I would suggest that we have not understood the first thing about God, His Grace or the Gospel we are called to proclaim.

Having told us to let God repay sinners, Paul instructs us to forgive our enemies, to overcome evil with good and of course Jesus said the same thing in our gospel reading. Now according to Jesus, if we do this, if we forgive our enemies, we are being good children of our Heavenly Father, following in his footsteps. Thus, it seems to me that God is not saying `forgive your enemies... because I'm going to get them for you' but rather `forgive your enemies because that's what I do. I forgive my enemies. I forgive sinners; whether it's `terrible' sinners like Myra Hindley or Adolf Hitler or common or garden sinners such as you'.

Now I know that a lot of people outside the church object to the idea that someone like Hindley could be forgiven even if she did repent but hopefully most Christians would accept that forgiveness is available to all who truly repent, even someone who killed children and made tape recordings of the murders so she could relive the experience again and again as Hindley did. Most Christians, I suggest, would assent to the proposition that God would have forgiven Hindley if she had genuinely repented ? as indeed she may have done. But what if she didn't? What does God do to her ? how does he feel about her ? then?

Well, dealing with the second of those questions first, I am convinced that God loved Myra Hindley just as much when she was on the moors killing those children as He would have done had she repented and done everything in her power to make amends. Not that there was much she could do to that end. Furthermore, and this is, I believe, a hugely significant point: I am equally convinced that God loved the unrepentant Myra Hindley just as much as he loved Mother Theresa or Francis of Assisi or whoever you consider to be the holiest person who's ever lived when they were at their most holy. Surely that must be the case if God's love is truly unconditional which I believe it is?

Now, a lot of people will say that God's love is unconditional but do they really believe that? A book that's very popular in some Christian circles is Philip Yancey's `What's so amazing about grace?' in which he asserts that there is nothing you can do to make God love you any more than He already does and nothing you can do to make Him love you any less'. Well, does that apply to Myra Hindley and Adolph Hitler or not? And if it doesn't, if in fact there are things you can do to make God love you less, well, surely we're all in trouble? Surely, as soon as we take one step down that road, we have `fallen from grace', a biblical expression which people now use to mean having sex or some such thing when in fact Saint Paul used it to mean trying to earn God's favour through good behaviour, as if God were our boss who will fire us if we fail to perform rather than our Father who loves us whatever we do.

Now, of course, this doesn't mean that God doesn't care that Myra Hindley killed those children. Nor does it mean that she can waltz into heaven unrepentant. As I said, the day of judgement will presumably not be a pleasant experience for Myra Hindley. But if God truly is the Father of the whole human race then however appalled he may be with her behaviour, and I'm sure he is appalled, he must still love her just as much as any human father or mother loves their wayward child ? and indeed, more than that. He must long for her repentance and her redemption and, like many Christians, I believe that when people come face to face with God, they, effectively, have no choice but to repent. To know Him is to love Him, to see Him is to understand.

And so I believe that eventually all people, Myra Hindley and Ian Brady included, will be reconciled to God. To me, that is the good news of the Gospel and yet bizarrely, many Christians seem horrified by the idea of all people being saved. Someone I was debating this issue with by email recently wrote `I really hope there is a hell'. He then referred to another criminal of the same order as Hindley, an unrepentant rapist and murderer and said, `at least I hope that people like him end up there. I believe in the scales of justice...

Well, I believe in the Gospel of Grace that says that God does not treat us as our sins deserve, that He forgives sinners. And where's the justice in that? Doesn't the Bible say that mercy triumphs over judgement? Now, of course, some people would point to the cross and say that a huge price had to be paid for God's forgiveness: the death of God incarnate. Thus was justice satisfied. Others, myself included, aren't sure that that way of understanding the cross is compatible with the non-violent, non-vengeful God proclaimed by Jesus; but eitherway, my point still stands: Saint Paul says that Christ died for us while we were still sinners. Christ died for the unrepentant Myra Hindley just as he died for the unrepentant Ravi Holy. I may subsequently have repented but it seems to me that God's forgiveness is not at all dependent on our willingness to repent. As our gospel reading said: he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.

So does this mean that repentance is irrelevant? Well, the answer to that is both yes and no. Of course, Myra Hindley must repent before she can be fully reconciled to God but the point at issue is that God's unconditional love is, by definition, not dependent on anything that we do or don't do. Otherwise it would be conditional. I really don't see how anyone can dispute that.

Now my correspondent who `believes in justice' qualified that by saying `I have no problem with God forgiving [the serial-killer he was talking about] if he comes to his senses and gets down on his knees'. And I suspect many Christians would say the same. But apart from the fact that they're failing to understand that God has already forgiven him, Hindley, everyone, and feels as tender towards them as he does towards the most pious person in the world, they are also making repentance the `work' that saves you, that earns God's forgiveness and love.

In Mother Earth, Crass asked `Tell me what's the difference between her [Myra Hindley] and you?' Now for me the answer to that is nothing. To quote Saint Paul in Romans again: there is no difference for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And I'm sure my justice-loving friend agrees ? to a certain extent. He no doubt genuinely thinks of himself as a sinner saved by grace and, as we've seen, he believes that Hindley too could be saved if she repents - or could have been saved had she repented assuming that he takes the traditional line that once you're dead, it's too late. Like many contemporary theologians, I don't accept that...

But if a decision that he has made (and that Hindley, quite possibly failed to make) is what makes the difference between where he and she spend eternity, well, what's to stop him from boasting as the Pharisee did: I thank you, O God that I am not as other people? Unlike this tax-collector, murderer, respectable unbeliever even, I repented of my sins, as they could have done had they been willing and so they are getting what they deserve, as am I. It saddens me to say that I have heard Christians who claim to believe in grace say precisely that...

Speaking for myself, I don't believe that I repented because I am morally superior to other people. As Saint Paul says, it's the grace of god that leads us to repentance and the same gracious God is just as committed to his daughter Myra as He is to me, you and everybody else. What's the difference between her and you? Literally nothing. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified freely by his grace. Now if the thought of that bothers you, then I suggest you ask yourself why...