George Tiller, Abortion, and Moral Clarity

The fact that those of us opposed to abortion find the work of late term abortionist George Tiller perverse and immoral does not mean that we give sanction to his assassination – either overtly or privately.

Scott Roeder, Tillers alleged killer, is misguided — and according to the New York Daily News, mentally ill. He is a man that has gone to great lengths to set back a cause he held so dear. Pro-abortion activists on the left have long accused the membership ranks of the pro-life movement as being filled with religiously rabid hypocrites and domestic terrorists, and of being part of a growing cadre of right wing extremists. Roeder’s lack of moral clarity has now provided them with a poster child. Just as the pro-life movement was winning converts and making legal headway with passionate, but reasoned and civil arguments against the practice of abortion, Roeder steps forward to tear down what had taken decades to build. He deserves our scorn (and pity) as much as Tiller. Murder is wrong. Roeder must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law and if found guilty he must be punished.

In fact, it is our collective inability to bring such moral clarity to the entire issue of abortion that has led to the deep cultural divisions and produced the kind of violence that killed Tiller. (more…)