Who would Jesus murder?

"George Tiller was a mass-murderer. I am concerned that the Obama Administration will use Tiller's killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions."

Randall Terry, found of Operation Rescue, on the murder of abortionist George Tiller.

George Tiller was an abortionist from Kansas - a controversial figure who ran just one of three clinics in America which performed 'late-term abortions.' This Sunday, while serving as an usher at Reformation Lutheran Church in Wichita, he was gunned down by by anti-Abortionist activist Scott Philip Roeder.

Tiller died instantly; Roeder had shot him in the head (knowing that Tiller wore a bullet-proof vest.) He was arrested three hours later in Kansas City.

This shooting is just the latest chapter in a decade long campaign of violence targeting American abortionists. So far, at least nine people have been murdered and almost two hundred others have been assaulted, attacked or been the victims of attempted murder - like RN Emily Lyons, who was blinded and crippled by a nail bomb in 1998.

I totally 'get' that people are against abortion. Even I think late-term abortion is incredibly questionable. Many fetuses are viable after 21 weeks, so the terminations doctors like George Tiller perform are killing babies, without ambiguity.

But how anybody can think that murder and terrorism are acceptable techniques to oppose abortion astonishes me. What makes it even more astonishing is when the people committing these crimes are so-called Christians.

At theological college, I learnt that Jesus' most important commandments were to love God with all your heart and "...love your neighbor as yourself." Mark 12:28-31.

Even your enemies should be 'loved as yourself' (Luke 10:25-37.) As far as I've always been taught, that's the most fundamental principle of Christianity - that all human life is sacred.

Whoever sheds the blood of a human, by a human shall that person's blood be shed; for in his own image God made humankind. Genesis 9:6

Of course, you can't hold Christianity (entirely) responsible for Scott Roeder's actions - reports are now emerging that he'd battled with mental illness for much of his life, which explains his skewed view of morality and how he justified doing what he did.

What I do find deeply disturbing is the sharp spotlight this horrible crime casts on the anti-abortion campaign. Abortion as a political and religious issue has always troubled me. I simply can't understand why conservative Christians tell us that abortion is a sin because 'all life is sacred' and then are vehemently, aggressively vocal in their support of capital punishment, gun ownership and America's military adventures abroad.

I'm not going to defend abortion - I'm certainly not going to defend 'late-term' abortions as performed by George Tiller. What I am going to argue is that Christian's support of capital punishment, for example, totally undermines their campaign against abortion.

(Similar accusations can be made against liberals, who argue that capital punishment is wrong, because 'all life is sacred' - yet support abortion!)

As far as I'm concerned, the only coherent argument is this; all life is sacred. Therefore, logically, both abortion and capital punishment are wrong.

If you support abortion, or you support capital punishment, you're basically saying that man has dominion over other people's lives (and deaths.) As long as one form of murder is acceptable, you can't cohesively argue against the other. It's all or nothing!

This is why I simply can't take any Christian claim that 'capital punishment is acceptable' seriously. It's not - if you claim to believe a word Jesus says.

Coffee Bean, who is brilliant in her appraisal of these things, discusses the issue on her website in this post. She quotes what Paul wrote in Romans 13:1-5 as possible justification for Capital Punishment:

Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.

Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.

For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you.

For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.

Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience.

In this piece of scripture, Paul argues that you should follow the laws, rules and guidelines of your governing authorities because (and Coffee Bean says it better than I could) "God establishes government for His purpose and that citizens are clearly commanded to be in subjection to governing authorities."

Therefore, if the government has a system for performing Capital Punishment, it is God's will that the death sentence be carried out.

I have two problems with this piece of scripture:

Firstly, Paul is a douche-bag (Galatians 1:13.) Unlike the other Apostles, Paul had never even met Jesus. I dismiss him as a religious zealot merely cashing in on Christ's name to spread a very dodgy interpretation of Jesus' message (it's not surprising that most of the anti-gay scripture in the Bible also comes from Paul's suspicious contributions.)

Paul's message in Romans is cynical scripture inspired to get lowly Christians to obey their patriarchal masters (the underpinnings of established religion for twenty decades.) It's utterly worthless.

Secondly, even if it wasn't bunk scripture, what kind of message does it give? That governing authority is always right? Does that mean that Hitler's Nazi Regime was practicing 'God's will' when they set out to exterminate the Jews? Or that Soviet Russia (which deemed religion the 'opiate of the masses') was doing God's work when Stalin sent millions to die in the Gulags?

Of course not - Coffee Bean herself points out that Jesus was a bit of a rebel, defying authority on every occasion. It was only after he'd died (and douche-bags like Paul started spreading his 'message') that the Catholic Church started advocating blind subservience to authority as part of the 'duty' of every good Christian.

As far as I'm concerned, Jesus had a simple message. Man doesn't have the right to judge whether another man is worthy to live or die. That's God's job, not ours.

James 4:12; "There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you—who are you to judge your neighbor?"

Here, Jesus tells it like it is. Only God can 'save and destroy' a life. And who the hell are you to go around judging anybody, anyway?

Scott Roeder himself argued that killing abortion doctors was 'justifiable homicide' because the old Testament said 'an eye for an eye.' But Jesus was the first person to denounce that.

Matthew 5:38-39; "You have heard that it was said, 'Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.' But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also."

In fact, Jesus explicitly points out how wrong it is for mere humans to believe that have the authority or the right to take away another human's life, even if convicted of a crime:

John 7:7; "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

In that section of the Bible, Jesus makes an angry crowd examine their own consciences, saying that only somebody who's never done anything wrong themselves is worthy of judging whether another person's sins are bad enough to merit paying the ultimate price.

It's all there in the Bible, in black and white. Jesus taught everybody that all life was sacred.

Bearing that in mind, I can fully understand why Christians object to abortion so much. However, until they reject the death penalty as well, I'll always consider their argument against abortion scripturally unsound and morally hypocritical.

It's that contradiction - which allows ambiguity between life, death, morality and murder - which sparked Scott Roeder's delusional justification for gunning down George Tiller in cold blood.

The Christian church taught him that murder was acceptable, which is why he ultimately resorted to it.