Richard Beck has a wonderful meditation about the cross of Jesus and how we should keep it from becoming merely an ornament to adorn our churches and necklaces. He recalls other means of execution where humanity brings down its curses upon the weak, specifically the death of Matthew Shepard tied to a fence in Wyoming and black men lynched in the Jim Crow south. I can’t do it justice in summary; it’s very moving.
Experimental Theology: The Fence of Matthew Shepard.