City Awaits the News : Protests: Ecumenical church service, street-corner rowdiness mark community’s death watch on Harris.

A death brought them together in protest Monday--one of the most debated, cheered, criticized, analyzed and postponed deaths in state history.

As the clock ticked toward the scheduled midnight execution of Robert Alton Harris, tension mounting with word of a possible eleventh-hour delay, there were vigils and demonstrations San Diego protesting California’s first execution in 25 years.

The chorus of opposing voices ranged from priests to college students to the mother of a murder victim. Their death-watch rhetoric invoked the biblical images that have been used by both sides, as a society engages in a painful philosophical debate on the airwaves and in the streets.

“We think the justice system is not supposed to act as an avenging angel,” said Mandy van Zytveld, 22, a UC San Diego senior who took part in a student demonstration organized by Amnesty International at the state office building downtown.

“Jesus said turn the other cheek and forgive your enemies,” said Bertha Crowell, a retired Point Loma schoolteacher.

Like the families of the teen-age boys whom Robert Alton Harris murdered, Crowell is a victim. Unlike them, her prolonged agony has been private rather than public. Her 38-year-old daughter was beaten to death by two men nine years ago in her rural Humboldt County home.

Nonetheless, Crowell joined a 7 p.m. interfaith vigil at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul to protest the execution.

“I never felt that execution was the right thing to do,” she said. “I miss my daughter every day, but murdering someone else would not bring her back.”

The vigil at the church, at 5th Avenue and Nutmeg Street, drew 150 people, a mix of races, creeds and ages. The church was still decorated with lilies from the previous day’s Easter service; Monday night’s interdenominational service intertwined the themes of Resurrection, reflection and forgiveness.

A 30-member Gospel choir performed upbeat hymns. Some of the choristers cried as they sang.

The Rev. Akio Miyaji of the San Diego Buddhist temple led the congregation in a meditation accompanied by the delicate strains of violins, gongs and chimes. He urged those who wanted peace to close their eyes.

The Rev. Jon Conner, deacon of Christ the King Church, said: “Let us pray for the forgiveness for all who have suffered injury and violence and for all of us who are good people who sit by and do nothing, for Lord, they know not what they do.”

In contrast, the event at the state building on Front Street downtown was noisier and more animated because there were several groups supporting the death penalty. About 25 demonstrators blew air horns, chanted the word “death” and urged passing motorists to “Honk if you want to see Harris smoke.”

Most motorists responded with honking horns and thumbs-up gestures.

Across the street, about 100 death penalty opponents held hands and sang spirituals at a candlelight vigil.

Both sides said the suspense was intensifying because of news late Monday that a federal appeals court was considering yet another last-minute appeal that might delay the execution.

“At this point we are hopeful because of the time frame involved,” said Kevin Gaffney, a 22-year-old college student. “We really have hope now.”

But opponents said they felt any delay would be only temporary.

“If not today, then tomorrow,” Jim Noeo said. “It’s only a matter of time.”

The juxtaposition of the execution date with the Easter holidays was a theme of religious leaders who gathered Monday afternoon at the Henry George Center, a housing complex in Linda Vista.

“It is ironic that this execution is happening just after Easter, when the message of Easter is to overcome evil through love and not through retribution,” said Gwen Jones-Lurvey, pastor of United Methodist Mid-City Church in Normal Heights. “It is that desire for revenge in humans that I hope, through the grace of God, we can rise above.”

The religious group argued that, although the killings were coldblooded, the state does not have the right to take a life in retribution.

“The crime committed by Robert Harris was hideous and barbaric,” said Rabbi Wayne D. Dosick, a professor of Judaic studies at the University of San Diego. “He snuffed out innocent young life with callous disregard. . . . But, no matter how heinous his act, no matter how deep our compassion for the families of the victims, how great our sense of loss for the victims themselves, we have no right to be like him.”

Some opponents acknowledged that they may speak for a minority in a city and state where the death penalty has gained considerable support.

But Steven Karp, who wore a black button and black ribbons symbolizing his views, said public enthusiasm for executions depends on how the question is asked. He cited a poll that found that, when asked whether they favored the death penalty or life imprisonment without parole and with mandatory restitution, most respondents chose the latter.

“When people are asked in the abstract whether or not they want the death penalty, they do want it,” said Karp, coordinator for the San Diego-based Committee Against the Death Penalty. “But, when they are given alternatives, then the overwhelming majority say they would abolish the death penalty.”