Posted on 06/03/2009 11:13:53 AM PDT by lewisglad
In a commentary today, Creighton theologian R.R. Reno parses the justifications for killing an abortion doctor like George Tiller, and finds that alleged murderer Scott Roeder came up short–though barely. Reno says that “The blanket condemnation [by Catholics bishops] of ‘violence’ seems unhelpfully expansive” and so he wants to explain that the reasons Tiller’s killer was wrong “are not as simple as they seem.”
Reno says that under Christian thinking, such an action would have to satisfy three conditions: It would target the guilty, not the innocent; it would have to be necessary (principally to protect others); and it would have to be an act of self-defense that does not “violate the principle of legitimate authority” by being premeditated and calculated violence, as Tiller’s killing was. Reno says the suspect got two out of three:
The emphasis on “unlawful use of violence,” the evocation of “vigilantism,” and the description of Tiller’s killer as a “vigilante killer” are all exactly right. We are all sinners, but it is painfully obvious that Dr. George Tiller acted in wanton disregard for the sanctity of life. Killing him did not violate the principle of innocence. Moreover, he gave no evidence of stopping. As a result, perhaps something like the principle of necessity can be satisfied. But it is certainly obvious that his killer was acting as the law unto himself. He arrogated to himself the roles of jury, judge, and executioner. He violated the principle of legitimate authority.
That strikes me as far too close to justification, as others would argue that unjust laws shouldn’t stop us. With their redesigned site, the First Things blog now allows comments, and the first commenter on Reno’s thread pressed him to go further, asking how Reno’s argument would apply to Bonhoeffer or the Nazi resistance. Good question.
(Excerpt) Read more at commonwealmagazine.org ...
My friend, YHWH bless him, is a messianic Jewish scholar, well versed in the old texts.
An unwanted child, raised without love in an orphanage or worse, endures a life of addiction and hate and sin and crime and pain.
As a result, the child's soul is forfeit. A sinner most foul.
The child grows and sins, as a result of the sad circumstances. And is damned.
Which would you prefer?
just...... wow......
What are you doing on FR?
He won’t comprehend why you are shocked by that completely specious analogy. The unregenerate mind cannot grasp the things of God.
Good point. Thank you for your insights, dear brother in Christ!
Jeepers...
Women who choose to have abortions have taken out a contract to have their babies murdered. They have essentially hired a hit man to kill their babies.
Now if anyone contracts to murder another human being, that person is considered complicate in the crime of murder and is just as guilty of it as the murderer.
The penalty for murder should be leveled at everyone involved who takes deliberate action to kill another human being.
I don’t like murder. However I do believe that things happen for a reason. Tiller knew the risks as he had been shot before. I am not sad he is gone but I wish it had been a natural death.
I'd have been happy with a lightning bolt from the sky. Wouldn't that have freaked them out?
Lmao! I just hate the bs that goes with his murder, had a lighting bolt hit him in Church then that would have freaked many people out for sure. Would that have been called an act of God? Or nature?
Examining only the act committed by Tiller the baby killer's killer (and not the very negative impact it will have on the pro-life movement), the above is what I find bothersome. But then I ask, as the author mentions and I quote below, what if Tiller had been Hitler or any one of the many known mass murderers....wait he was.
"That strikes me as far too close to justification, as others would argue that unjust laws shouldn’t stop us. With their redesigned site, the First Things blog now allows comments, and the first commenter on Reno’s thread pressed him to go further, asking how Reno’s argument would apply to Bonhoeffer or the Nazi resistance. Good question."
Thanks for the ping!
Only if you would have tried them for killing their babies 2 hours after birth.
It must be hard for the average American to get his/her mind around the concept of "viable." It means that there is absolutely nothing that would prevent this child from living outside the womb.
Let me ask you this: IF a child is a "baby" at the moment of birth, what was it one minute prior?
And IF you would prosecute a woman who killed her baby through an accomplice, one minute after its birth, why would you give a pass for killing it one minute before its birth?
How many pro-lifers here with these magnanimous views on Tiller's redemption are Catholic?
I just want to know exactly where I got off this bus?
btw...several freepers I know personally and who are Catholic have freepmailed me and told me they agree with me. They have no worry about Tiller's soul and nor is all life equally “precious”.
I don't know many serious southern SBC, COC, Pentecost or AOG that think like what I'm seeing there.
not trying to pick a fight btw....the goals are the same but i am definitely not movement pro-life...which has been somethignof a revelation to me frankly
why all this concern over the fate of folks who kill viable babies with hypotheticals?
if PBA was a crime in Kansas then the baby carriers (they ain’t mothers yall) should be charged.
that is not true....there are only two other docs who publicly have said they do this sort of abortion...and yes that guy said he would come down (proffitt or something like that..DFU ran an expose on him yesterday)
which means he won’t be killing babies back where he came from...
besides they all deserve the chance at life
by your logic we should carpet bomb Bangladesh or Liberia to send all those poor kids straight to Christ...their life being so dismal here and all
I do not think that is a correct assessment. In fact, It sounds like you are playing on the issue of salvation to make some kind of point to support late term abortion.
Please take a look at some photos of late term abortion and then come back.
In what respect? That they are praying for him still?
and this snippet from another thread by Father Pavone.
“”But whatever the motives, we at Priests for Life continue to insist on a culture in which violence is never seen as the solution to any problem”
and what a lot of other movement freepers here have been saying....a lot of platitudes that equivocate every life and are pacifist sounding
maybe things have changed but there is a marked difference in all that and what I was taught as a lad and a Southern Baptist..
and this bugs me.....Christianity doesn't own this...why would anyone even half decent need Christianity to tell them aborting viable babies at late term is wrong?...my anti-abortion views are not based on my belief that Christ was God's son who came here to suffer and die on our behalf
anyhow...it's all been an eye opener, I never knew my own views were so divergent with movement folks here like they are.
I don't want to be like that but I sure appreciate their efforts...
I suppose you’re correct in that the pool has been reduced by one.
It will be interesting to see who this man’s associates are when it comes up at trial.
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