Wikipedia calls her a "Priestess of the American Episcopal Church."
Posted on 05/01/2009 1:30:19 PM PDT by InvisibleChurch
"Abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Let me hear you say it: abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Abortion is a blessing and our work is not done."
That was the Rev. Katherine Hancock Ragsdale in 2007, repetitiously inciting her disciples to be not just pro-choice but fanatically pro-abortion. This is significant because, according to standard journalistic stylebooks, Ragsdale does not exist. We're told that pro-choice folks don't like abortion; they're just trying to help a woman facing tragedy. Ragsdale, though, says abortion is a "blessing," and not only in harsh situations but good ones: "When a woman becomes pregnant within a loving, supportive, respectful relationship; has every option open to her; decides she does not wish to bear a child; and has access to a safe, affordable abortion—there is not a tragedy in sight—only blessing. The ability to enjoy God's good gift of sexuality without compromising one's education, life's work, or ability to put to use God's gifts and call is simply blessing."
Ragsdale is in the news because of a plum appointment: On July 1 she is scheduled to become president of Episcopal Divinity School, a major seminary near Harvard that was founded in 1974 when two venerable divinity schools (founded in 1858 and 1867) merged.
Hear some more of Ragsdale's statement to her troops: "I want to thank all of you who protect this blessing—who do this work every day: the health care providers, doctors, nurses, technicians, receptionists, who put your lives on the line to care for others (you are heroes—in my eyes, you are saints); the escorts and the activists; the lobbyists and the clinic defenders; all of you. You're engaged in holy work."
Ragsdale is a member of the board of NARAL Pro-Choice America and for eight years chaired the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Rights. Nevertheless, calling abortion "holy work" seemed so over-the-top that WORLD called Ragsdale to ask whether a fanatic had taken her name in a variant of identity theft. Ragsdale acknowledged that the words were hers and that she still identified abortion with "blessing." She said, though, that she had pulled that speech off her website because it was "creating an occasion for sin" as readers posted critical comments. She also said she's "really busy and can't keep up with the comments coming in." How has Ragsdale developed her position? I looked on her website at sermons that remain. In 2005 she asked rhetorically why pro-lifers did not look at pro-aborts "with tolerance and respect." She then said, "The answer to that question is that in this arena it is women who must make the final decision and that you do not respect the moral agency (or full personhood) of women simply because we are women." Convenient: It's not about life; it's about sexism.
But go back further, to an Easter sermon in 2003 when she said that the Resurrection may never have happened. (Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "If Christ has not been raised, our faith is futile . . . we are of all people most to be pitied.") And go back further to Easter 2002: "The suffering and death of Jesus, according to the theory of the Atonement, pays for our sins and buys our salvation. It's an interesting theory, but not one that I find compelling."
Some denominations have cracked open on issues of homosexual ordination, but the fissure began long before, when clerics put God on trial and chose which doctrines they found compelling. In 2003, proclaiming her lesbianism, Ragsdale took aim at those who say that "we can't help being gay—the old take pity, have mercy, argument. You know, the one that concludes with a plaintive—who would choose this? Let me answer that with three words: Me! Me! Me!"
The tragedy of abortion is bad enough, but the origin of the tragedy, and so many others of our time, emerges from worship not of Christ but of "me, me, me." Katherine Ragsdale may show this tendency in a heightened form, but all of us display it to some degree. May God have mercy on her, on her students, and on all of us.
What sick and twisted people.
“Reverend”?
of what? rabidmoonbattery?
Doesn’t that broad realize that today it is the babies and tomorrow it will be the elderly. May God have mercy on us.
It’s basically Government funded birth control that is used by the inner city.
Just as she becomes "elderly".
God will not be mocked, they will reap their reward...
Presidents who were adherents:
George Washington
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison
James Monroe
William Henry Harrison
John Tyler
Zachary Taylor
Franklin Pierce
Chester A. Arthur
Theodore Roosevelt
Franklin Roosevelt
Gerald Ford
George H. W. Bush
"When a woman becomes pregnant within a loving, supportive, respectful relationship; has every option open to her; decides she does not wish to bear a child; and has access to a safe, affordable abortion—there is not a tragedy in sight—only blessing. The ability to enjoy God's good gift of sexuality without compromising one's education, life's work, or ability to put to use God's gifts and call is simply blessing."
So the reverend thinks it's a child but that ending the child's life is the blessing?? Some of our greatest thinkers and leaders have been born into the most impoverished, unpleasant conditions and rose above it.
Seriously twisted. What if said mother in loving relationship with good job and employed loving spouse finds herself out of work and loving spouse has run off just months after child has successfully survived the womb? What then, reverend?
“What sick and twisted people.”
Yes they are. But, if you are a Christian, like me, then I can’t say I am surprised, nor should any Christian who has studied the Scriptures. The Bible foretold of these things many years ago. Also, I try to temper my disgust with sympathy. These poor souls are lost, as was I. I am truly no better, the only difference is now I call Christ my Lord, Master and Friend. I just wish the world would come to Him, then they too could experience the overwhelming Joy that only He can give.-—JM
This makes me sick. On the day we learn Obama gets to appoint a Supreme Court justice it’s especially depressing.
Ragsdale must be sorry she wasn’t aborted.
the Rev. Katherine Hancock Ragsdale
So this “ Reverand” has placed herself above the Lord God and decided that the Lords blessing of children is not a blessing and that the means to kill those children is the real blessing???
Lucy you gonna have some splainin to do.......
This as sick. My gut twists and I feel nauseous at stories like this. As an American, a Minister of the Gospel, and most importantly a follower of Jesus Christ, I can tell you without fear of Biblical contradiction — this woman is not a Christian. This woman is not a minister of the Gospel. This woman is engaged in the business of deception, and she is employed by the Father of Lies. Nothing is more Antichrist than to justify and CELEBRATE the destruction of unborn life, as this woman does. Anathema, Maranatha!
I suppose that abortion is the initiation sacrament into this ‘reverend’s’ church. There is a very special place in hell for her.
Wikipedia calls her a "Priestess of the American Episcopal Church."
I would NOT want to be her at Judgment...wow...
The Episcopal church is wicked, root and branch. A local congregation left the Episcopals and joined a more conservative Anglican branch. The Episcopals took back the property in the law suit. They can’t afford to keep it open, so they are making the beautiful gothic church into a hotel. This contrasts the one in Denver that was sold to a nightclub that serves punch from the baptismal fount. This particular church ran a small school. The Episcopals won that in law suit as well. Upon being declared the winners of the suit they said, “Why would we want to run a school?” and so they shut it down, three weeks before the end of the school year.
I wish I could say that I don’t believe that someone would say that, but unfortunately I do.
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