If, as John Rawls observed, justice is being fair, how do we define what is fair?  If, as much of America's judicial system seems to say, justice is being retributive, how do we decide what is appropriate?
     To the point, for the length of its relatively short history, America has arrived at what it considers "just" through social and political consensus.  Under the weight of cultural and historical circumstances, such consensus, however, inevitably changes.
     Hence, the issue remains:  how do we know what true justice is?  Compounding this dilemma is the challenge embedded in Emily Dickinson's long ago observation that, "This world is not conclusion."  Does believing that this world is but a part of a much greater whole solve the problem?  Will deciding that this world "is not conclusion" allow us to contemplate and do justice in a more expansive and realistic way?
     It can.  Only if, however, we admit that, ultimately, we will always be dependent, materially and epistemologically, on a presence in whom resides the final boundary and definition of what is just.
     Otherwise, we are creating justice with a justice that may not actually be just.  We're just dancing in the dark.