Speaking of war and I know CZ linked us to an article regarding the tragic assassination of Dr. George Tiller. I personally believe that this was an act of domestic terrorism and I am shocked that Tiller was murdered in his house of worship.
Here are some interesting thoughts from Frank Schaeffer, son of Francis Schaeffer, an evangelical pro-lifer leader who in the early 80's wrote the book,
A Christian Manifesto.
Frank has now repented of his former involvement with the Christian Right pro-life movement so I think that his article has some revealing insight.
" My late father and I share the blame (with many others) for the murder of Dr. George Tiller the abortion doctor gunned down on Sunday. Until I got out of the religious right (in the mid-1980s) and repented of my former hate-filled rhetoric I was both a leader of the so-called pro-life movement and a part of a Republican Party hate machine masquerading as the moral conscience of America.
In the late 1970s my evangelical pro-life leader father Francis Schaeffer and Dr. C. Everett Koop (who soon become Surgeon General in the Reagan administration) went on the road with me taking the documentary antiabortion film series I produced and directed (
Whatever Happened to the Human Race?) to the evangelical public. The series and companion book eventually brought millions of heretofore non-political evangelical Americans into the antiabortion crusade. We personally also got people like Jerry Falwell, Ronald Reagan and countless Republican leaders involved in the issue.
In the early 80s my father followed up with a book that sold over a million copies called
A Christian Manifesto. In certain passages he advocated force if all other methods for rolling back the abortion ruling of Roe v. Wade failed. He compared America and its legalized abortion to Hitler's Germany and said that whatever tactics would have been morally justified in removing Hitler would be justified in trying to stop abortion. I said the same thing in a book I wrote (
A Time For Anger) that right wing evangelicals made into a best seller. For instance Dr. James Dobson (of the Focus On the Family radio show) gave away over 100,000 copies."
He goes on to say:
"Angry speech has become the norm in American religion from both the right and the left. Words are spoken which -- when taken seriously -- lead directly to violence by the unhinged and/or the truly committed.
When evangelicals on the right call President Obama a socialist, a racist, anti-American, an abortionist, not a real American, and, echoing the former Vice President, someone who is weakening America's defenses and making us less safe,
the logical conclusion is violence. If you take these words literally you might pull the trigger to "make America safe" and/or free us from communism or to even protect us from -- what some "Christian" leaders claim -- Obama as the Antichrist."
And then he offers an apology.
Frank Schaeffer: How I (and Other "Pro-Life" Leaders) Contributed to Dr. Tiller's Murder
I am sooo tired of listening to the rants of extremists who think that our culture is being attacked by evil satanic forces. This type of speech only fuels the fear and I have personally seen what that fear can do..it is very scary to witness and when such teachings hits you over the head like a two ton gorilla, it is also very hard to walk away from your faith community. I admire Frank Schaeffer for doing so and for writing about these experiences.
id you not read [at Genesis 1:27; 2:24] that he who created them [Adam and Steve] from the beginning made them male and male and said: For this reason a man will leave his father and his father and will stick to his husband, and the two will be one flesh?
