Video: Erika Kirk forgives Charlie Kirk's assassin

Erika Kirk, the wife of conservative activist and Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk, powerfully announced during Sunday’s memorial service at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, that she forgave the young man who recently assassinated her husband at Utah Valley University.

During Sunday’s massive memorial service for the 31-year-old Christian and conservative activist, Erika Kirk shared how her husband had a passion for reaching out to young men in America who are without hope and direction.

“Charlie passionately wanted to reach and save the lost boys of the West. The young men who feel like they have no direction, no purpose, no faith, and no reason to live,” Erika Kirk said. “The men wasting their lives on distractions and the men consumed with resentment, anger, and hate. Charlie wanted to help them. He wanted them to have a home with Turning Point USA.”

Erika Kirk explained that when Charlie Kirk held events on college campuses and debated liberal students, he was trying to “show them a better path and a better life.” 

“My husband, Charlie, he wanted to save young men, just like the one who took his life,” Erka Kirk said. “That young man. That young man.”

“On the cross, our Savior said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they not know what they do.’ That man, that young man, I forgive him. I forgive him because it was what Christ did and is what Charlie would do,” Kirk added. “The answer to hate is not hate. The answer we know from the gospel is love and always love. Love for our enemies and love for those who persecute us.”

Last week, 22-year-old Tyler Robinson was charged by Utah County Prosecutor Jeffrey Gray with aggravated murder, felony discharge of a firearm causing serious bodily injury, two counts of obstruction of justice, two counts of tampering with a witness, and a violent offense committed in the presence of a child. 

While Gray announced that the state intends to pursue the death penalty in Robinson’s case, Erika Kirk told The New York Times that she does not want to decide whether the 22-year-old is punished with the death penalty. 

“I’ve had so many people ask, ‘Do you feel anger toward this man? Like, do you want to seek the death penalty?’ I’ll be honest. I told our lawyer, I want the government to decide this,” Kirk said. “I do not want that man’s blood on my ledger. Because when I get to heaven, and Jesus is like: ‘Uh, eye for an eye? Is that how we do it?’ And that keeps me from being in heaven, from being with Charlie?”