| Author |
 Topic  |
|
Chris R
Mary's Servant
USA
259 Posts |
 Posted - Jun 05 2009 : 2:05:31 PM
|
Okay okay, I know I'm not supposed to rejoice in anyone's death. That said, I can't help but feel pretty good that Tiller is finally gone.
Empasizing that I'm not an advocate of vigilantism & would never do it myself, I kinda feel like Tiller had it coming to him. In killing Tiller, what Roeder did in my view is no different than killing a mass murderer (use whatever analogy you want to... Tiller was in the business of slaughtering innocents).
|
|
|
Lil Flora
Mary's Servant
103 Posts |
Posted - Jun 06 2009 : 5:58:14 PM
|
Well, there goes "the sanctity of (human) life". Perhaps it should be "the sanctity of unborn (human) life" instead.
After all, only the helpless/innocent/voiceless/defenseless/vulnerable who have the right to life...right?
The first two parts were sarcasm, but seriously, this is the sort of thing that gives pro-lifers a "bad rep". Given the fact that pro-life sentiment was actually on the rise before this, it sounds like the pro-life movement shot itself in the foot (no pun intended).
Unless, of course, the lives of the unborn truly are superior to that of the already-born... (That was not sarcasm, that is something that I feel truly needs to be addressed)
My apologies if I've offended anyone, but deifying the unborn (or any other group) really annoys me, especially when the price is payed in anyone's blood.
St. Flora, Patroness of abandoned people, pray for us |
 |
|
|
Justin
Formation
26 Posts |
Posted - Jun 09 2009 : 12:19:12 PM
|
The Catholic Catechism 2261 explains the difference between the babies and Tiller. There is a difference between the evil and the innocent.
And further Catechism 2263 2264 and 2265 explain why as a society we are responsible for defending the ones we as adults are supposed to protect. 2269 says we do not put up with the murder being commited by Tiller. 2273 says INNOCENT life.
I think most everyone can acknowledge the government and legal system is broken, i.e. homosexual marriage pushed on the states even though the people vote against it, OR a single judge overturning the will of the people on other issues, same with the life issue, our legal system does not hold the sancitity of life. In Tiller's Kansas court trial a few months ago he admitted to killing a baby the day before the due date along with many more babies killed by him, in Kansas Gov Sebelius (now HHS Sec)was his buddy and vetoed the abortion law passed by the legislature, he gave the gov millions in campaign money.
So if the legal system does not respect life and Tiller personally killed tens of thousands, then based on Catechism 2265, we as a society are responsible and have a duty for defending the babies.
Every person killed by Hitler was a legal death, the German laws sanctioned every death , just as the abortion law does now. So after Hitler killed a few thousand, if someone would have killed Hitler to save millions of lives, would you say good riddence to evil ? or that Hilter should live so many more should die ? which one do you chose ? their legal system was as broke as ours so there was no stopping Hitler short of his death. A german court ruling would not have stopped the deaths.
On a family level if someone breaks into my house, I assume the intent is to do harm and I protect my kid, with lethal force if neccesary as 2265 says we have a duty to protect people we are responsible for. On a society level if someone is killing thousands and the system stands by and allows it, and Tiller was given many chances to repent, then someone acted since the society was not fulfilling the Duty to protect as 2265 says we must.
We have evil in this world. Tiller was not an innocent.
To put Tiller's live on the same level as millions of dead innocents is to not recognise the word's God often says - Innocent & Evil There is a difference.
Now the 10,000 babies Tiller would have killed in the rest of his professional career may live, and others Doctors may follow their Hippocratic oath of "first do no harm" and think twice before they go down that dark evil path.
Justin, homeschooling father to Peter |
Edited by - Justin on Jun 09 2009 12:26:36 PM |
|
|
|
Chris R
Mary's Servant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Jun 09 2009 : 1:50:05 PM
|
| Thanks Justin. I no longer have the energy to present the argument that you have presented so effectively. In my assessment, there is no logical argument against what you have stated. Well done. |
|
|
|
DeniseLawson
Moderator
USA
808 Posts |
Posted - Jun 09 2009 : 9:43:08 PM
|
quote:
Originally posted by Chris R
Okay okay, I know I'm not supposed to rejoice in anyone's death. That said, I can't help but feel pretty good that Tiller is finally gone.
Empasizing that I'm not an advocate of vigilantism & would never do it myself, I kinda feel like Tiller had it coming to him. In killing Tiller, what Roeder did in my view is no different than killing a mass murderer (use whatever analogy you want to... Tiller was in the business of slaughtering innocents).
Actually - it is very different. It is vigilante-ism. It is as morally wrong as what Tiller did. I doubt you will find any support for what Roeder did anywhere in Church teaching.
All human beings have the right to life, from natural conception through to natural death. The only time it is ever right to take that life prematurely is in legitimate acts of self defense or in state-conducted executions AFTER the person has had a fair trial AND ONLY IF the death penalty is the only way to protect innocent lives from this person.
True pro-life is about valuing human life at all stages - in this world and the world to come. We are called to correct the George Tillers of the world and encourage them to repent and hopefully see the errors of their ways, not kill them before they repent. Saving lives should not be just the lives of the unborn, but the souls of all in the hereafter as well.
Justin had an interesting interpretation of the paragraphs from the Catechism that he noted. I seriously doubt, however, that you will find any legitimate Church authority that agrees with his interpretation. Church teaching is quite clear that committing an evil act - even if it brings about a greater good - is always wrong.
------------------------
Jesus meek and humble of heart, make my heart like yours. |
Edited by - DeniseLawson on Jun 09 2009 10:07:15 PM |
|
|
|
Chris R
Mary's Servant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Jun 10 2009 : 09:14:13 AM
|
"I seriously doubt, however, that you will find any legitimate Church authority that agrees with his interpretation."
Unfortunately, so many priests and bishops don't agree with official Church teaching (and purposfully convolute the obvious meaning as a consequence of their quiet defiance) that you are largely correct here. There's nothing ambiguous about the references Justin made (nor was their anything creative or novel in his representation). |
Edited by - Chris R on Jun 10 2009 09:15:06 AM |
|
|
|
Antonio A
Maryhead
825 Posts |
Posted - Jun 12 2009 : 01:23:41 AM
|
Hi Chris R,
"Unfortunately, so many priests and bishops don't agree with official Church teaching (and purposefully convolute the obvious meaning as a consequence of their quiet defiance) that you are largely correct here.
Two wrongs don't make it right! The Church's moral teaching is very clear, "The end does not justify the means!" which is the opposite of what Machiavelli wrote in his work "The Prince," "the end does justify the means," which, to him meant that any government that wanted to do whatever, was justified in murdering the opposition just to attain its ends.
I would be hypocritical if I were to tell you I almost cried when I heard Tiller was gone, but I know better than to try to justify his murder because, after all, that is what it was. We are pro-life people, and no one who is in favor of life can justify 1) The murder even of a guilty man, 2) vigilante justice. The Church is clear in what it believes, that we must respect life from the moment of conception to natural death. Nowhere in the Catechism does one find justification for the murder of Tiller as evil as the man was. The teaching of the Church does not say "Only the life of the innocent must be respected."
"There's nothing ambiguous about the references Justin made (nor was their anything creative or novel in his representation)."
Let's see, Justin wrote: "And further Catechism 2263 2264 and 2265 explain why as a society we are responsible for defending the ones we as adults are supposed to protect. 2269 says we do not put up with the murder being committed by Tiller. 2273 says INNOCENT life.
Justin's key words here are "we do not put up with the murder being committed by Tiller," and that is a "stretch" of what paragraph 2269 states. Everything about life in the Catechism has to be taken within its proper context and its proper context is "Among such fundamental rights one should mention in this regard every human being's right to life and physical integrity from the moment of conception until death." (CDF, Donum vitae III).Its very unfortunate Tiller did not respect the life of the unborn and it is ironical that his killer obviously did not respect his life either. His murder reminds me of the words of Our Lord, "He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword!"
Antonio A. Obregón |
Edited by - Antonio A on Jun 12 2009 01:27:03 AM |
|
|
|
Chris R
Mary's Servant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Jun 13 2009 : 11:09:21 AM
|
Antonio, Maybe, probably, you correctly represent the Church's teaching on this matter. If so, it is to me very problematic... how do you deal with Justin's Hitler analogy (in which he suggests a morally equivalence that I think has merit)? If we really believe that the pre-born are as human as Hitler's victims, how can we say on the one hand that the assassin who kills Hitler (and let us recall that Hitler and his minions were acting with lawful authority) is not culpable for murder; while, on the other, the assassin who killed Tiller is culpable? I think the Church has a logical consistency problem here.
You said: "Its very unfortunate Tiller did not respect the life of the unborn and it is ironical that his killer obviously did not respect his life either."
Unfortunate? Is that how you really feel about it? Would you have said that it is UNFORTUNATE that Hitler did not respect the lives of the jews? Would you have found it IRONICAL (in your context, also UNFORTUNATE) if someone would have (in an act of vigilantism acting on no authority other than obedience to his conscience) killed Hitler and ended the madness? Were Hitler's victims more human than the unborn?
The Church would tell us that a person has a moral obligation to defend himself, even to the point of killing a person to do it. How does it follow then, that there is no moral obligation to defend the unborn in the same way if that is the only means to accomplish the defense? It seems to me that if your interpretation of Church teaching is correct, the Church must not really, REALLY, consider the life of the unborn to have the same value as the life of the born.
|
Edited by - Chris R on Jun 13 2009 11:27:35 AM |
|
|
|
JRJ
Mary's Servant
USA
136 Posts |
Posted - Jun 13 2009 : 2:19:42 PM
|
| Chris R, I understand your loathing of Dr. Tiller's murderous career. It is easy to lose sight of his humanity. I, too struggle with my feelings. This is understandable, but Jesus asks us to be perfect even as our Heavenly Father is perfect - a tall order!! For which God will send the graces necessary... Dr. Tiller was a human being with the innate dignity of every human person. Murder is murder, whether it was Dr. Tiller killing a child in the womb with the mother's consent or the shooter killing Dr. Tiller in his church. Am I thrilled that his clinic is closed? Did I reflect on how many children and mothers were saved because he could not conduct his state-sanctioned killings any longer? Of course. At the same time, I have prayed for his soul and for his accused killer. By murdering the man, the shooter has let the evil Dr. Tiller cooperated with every day infect his own life. If we are pro-life, we are for every single life. This was not self-defense and only remotely a defense of others - and we do not know if it was intended in that way - and may actually harm the building up of a culture of life in our republic. I have thought, since the day Dr. Tiller was killed, about Jesus' earthly life and pondered the evils of His time. He helped the people in a positive way and never harmed a human being. One thought from Him and we would cease to exist, yet He, God, did not see fit to kill those perpetrating evil during that time. That is His example. I sometimes find it hard to accept, but then I have found so much of the Faith hard to accept, yet its teaching proves to be for my good every single time.#13;#10;#13;#10;#13;#10;#13;#10;Jennifer |
Edited by - JRJ on Jun 14 2009 7:10:41 PM |
|
|
|
Chris R
Mary's Servant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Jun 13 2009 : 8:57:51 PM
|
Thanks for the thoughtful response Jennifer. Still, however, I don't think that the logical quagmire has been addressed (I truly wish someone could come up with a way to do this!).
Regarding your comment: "This was...only remotely a defense of others..." Huh? Tiller murdered thousands for a living. His death ended his ability to inflict any more horror. How can you question that the killing of this MONSTER wasn't an act to defend others? |
|
|
|
JRJ
Mary's Servant
USA
136 Posts |
Posted - Jun 13 2009 : 9:29:03 PM
|
quote:
Originally posted by Chris R#13;#10;
Thanks for the thoughtful response Jennifer. Still, however, I don't think that the logical quagmire has been addressed (I truly wish someone could come up with a way to do this!).#13;#10;#13;#10;Regarding your comment: "This was...only remotely a defense of others..." Huh? Tiller murdered thousands for a living. His death ended his ability to inflict any more horror. How can you question that the killing of this MONSTER wasn't an act to defend others?#13;#10;
I thought you might wonder about that. I am saying that we do not know the shooter's motive. Did he intend to stop Dr. Tiller from killing more unborn children? Did he have another/other motive/motives? It's unlikely anyone who would commit an obviously premeditated murder had good motives. If the shooter had, for example, entered Dr. Tiller's clinic to save his own child after having exhausted all legal means of trying to stop the abortion, in my opinion that would be defense of others - though still against our laws. Dr. Tiller was at church, not killing the unborn at the moment he was murdered. Keep in mind that the shooter endangered many people by his choice of where and when to murder Dr. Tiller. Innocent parties could easily have been gravely injured or killed. These are not actions that show respect for all life.
Jennifer |
|
|
|
Justin
Formation
26 Posts |
Posted - Jun 13 2009 : 11:04:47 PM
|
winning the evil of slavery in 1860s , was done with force by the righteous side, people killed to stop the evil.
winning civil rights in the 1960s was done with force too, peaceful ways only went so far.
Moses had the Levites take their swords to execute 3000 people, people killed others as God wanted/directed. (exodus 32:27-28)
The Israelites in Numbers 21:33-35 killed many more people under God's orders.
Joshua (6:21) killed many more people as God wanted.
There are other times God killed directly , with the flood of Noah, with the plague of the first born of Egypt, with sodom and gomorrah. But there are other times he uses good men to kill others, for His purpose, whatever that is, that we do not know.
I will not pretend to know if God used a man last week to stop a mass murder, I DO know history shows that many more times than listed above, that God has used the hand of man and the sword of man to take care of His business.
today's army soldier is not condemned by the Church when he kills to stop an evil man/government in this world. So the concept of killing for a better good exists, sometimes it may be a government to direct it, and other times God may direct a man.
tolerance is not in the Bible, Evil and innocence is, as is people slaying people with God's approval.
my son came very close to being aborted several times from 3 to 6 months due to his mom's severe depression, I had to fight for his life!!, that is why I am a single dad who raised him since birth, I am thankful other parents will be able to raise their kids, think of the babies that were on tiller's schedule the next day that had their abortion's cancelled, leaping for joy in the womb.
Justin, homeschooling father to Peter |
Edited by - Justin on Jun 13 2009 11:17:34 PM |
|
|
|
JRJ
Mary's Servant
USA
136 Posts |
Posted - Jun 14 2009 : 7:06:20 PM
|
I was just now listening to a podcast of Fr. Mitch Pacwa of EWTN teaching on the Old Testament. He was lecturing on Moses and the time that Moses killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave. Because he had killed an Egyptian and had learned he was a Hebrew, Moses had to run away to avoid execution. Fr. Pacwa's discussion of this action taken by Moses: Moses tried to save his people by his own power, in his own way and it did not work. He had to take time to discern what God willed and was later able to save his people in God's way and at God's time.
Jennifer |
|
|
|
Antonio A
Maryhead
825 Posts |
Posted - Jun 14 2009 : 8:44:02 PM
|
Chris R,
"Antonio, Maybe, probably, you correctly represent the Church's teaching on this matter."
I am certain that if you ask the Pope himself if I had represented to you and all readers the teaching of the Church correctly, he would say "yes," although that does not mean we have an easy moral teaching and people like you can't ask heavy moral questions.
If so, it is to me very problematic... how do you deal with Justin's Hitler analogy (in which he suggests a morally equivalence that I think has merit)?
O.K, let us take Justin's issue which is not just Justin's but the position of those who see nothing wrong with Tiller's demise. If you or I had lived in Nazi Germany in 1943 and we witnessed Nazis butchering Jews, would we had been justified in killing the Nazis? I think "yes," and I doubt our Church would have condemned us. If Tiller is murdered by a person thinking that he had to do that to stop the killing of the unborn, why is it that we would condemn him instead of praising him for killing the butcher Tiller, as we would for the killers of any Nazis? Isn't that what Justin is essentially saying? I hate to tell you Chris, but I don't have an answer right now for this moral dilemma, but that doesn't mean I can't find out if there is an answer. I'll work on it this week.
If we really believe that the pre-born are as human as Hitler's victims, how can we say on the one hand that the assassin who kills Hitler (and let us recall that Hitler and his minions were acting with lawful authority) is not culpable for murder; while, on the other, the assassin who killed Tiller is culpable? I think the Church has a logical consistency problem here.
That might very well be the case but since I don't fully know, don't you, and Justin, and I, and all Catholics with the same question, have a moral obligation to find out what the Church teaches on this matter?
You said: "Its very unfortunate Tiller did not respect the life of the unborn and it is ironical that his killer obviously did not respect his life either."
Unfortunate? Is that how you really feel about it? Would you have said that it is UNFORTUNATE that Hitler did not respect the lives of the Jews? Would you have found it IRONICAL (in your context, also UNFORTUNATE) if someone would have (in an act of vigilantism acting on no authority other than obedience to his conscience) killed Hitler and ended the madness? Were Hitler's victims more human than the unborn?
Good questions Chris, but I don't have an aswer, but I do have several answers that seem to contradict this whole business of murdering Tiller.
1. The Church does not teach that vigilante justice is moral.
2. The Church teaches that the end does not justify the means.
3. The Church teaches that no one is the judge of life or death but God, for only God gave us life and only God can take it away.
4. The Church teaches that in certain cases the State has the right to execute a criminal for the sake of the common good.
5. The Church teaches us that we can't kill anyone but that in self-defense we sometimes have no choice on the matter. If a man breaks into your house with a knife in his hand, he has no intention to pray the Rosary with you. You would have a moral responsibility to protect yourself and your family from an imminent demise.
6. Members of the military can go to war when their government sends them there, provided it is a "just" war. Who "knows" what a just war is? The government should and for Catholics it is a matter of prudential judgment.
7. In the case when a husband is asked to give permission to either save the life of his child or save the life of the mother because one of them might die as a result of birth, neither the mother nor the husband has the right to give his or her consent for the death of anyone for neither is the judge of life or death. This much I know.
I'm also puzzle at the fact that Pius XII repeatedly called for peace during WWII even as he knew the war was just because we were fighting an evil man, Hitler. At least one can explain Benedict XV's condemnation of WWI because the war had no good reason for its existence, but what about World War II?
The Church would tell us that a person has a moral obligation to defend himself, even to the point of killing a person to do it. How does it follow then, that there is no moral obligation to defend the unborn in the same way if that is the only means to accomplish the defense? It seems to me that if your interpretation of Church teaching is correct, the Church must not really, REALLY, consider the life of the unborn to have the same value as the life of the born.
Well, that might be a feasible conclusion but knowing the moral teaching of the Church, do you really think that is her position?
Also Chris, you and I and Justin, and Jennifer and Denise, we are Catholics because we believe that Holy Mother Church is here to teach us how to go through life. If that isn't the case, why be a Catholic at all? Why not allow our consciences to guide us through life with what our consciences think it's best?
Antonio A. Obregón |
Edited by - Antonio A on Jun 17 2009 01:45:58 AM |
|
|
|
Antonio A
Maryhead
825 Posts |
Posted - Jun 14 2009 : 8:46:28 PM
|
Hi JRJ,
I was just now listening to a podcast of Fr. Mitch Pacwa of EWTN teaching on the Old Testament. He was lecturing on Moses and the time that Moses killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave. Because he had killed an Egyptian and had learned he was a Hebrew, Moses had to run away to avoid execution. Fr. Pacwa's discussion of this action taken by Moses: Moses tried to save his people by his own power, in his own way and it did not work. He had to take time to discern what God willed and was later able to save his people in God's way and at God's time.
This makes much sense even coming from a Jesuit, but I believe Chris has good questions which the Church may not have easy answers for. I also believe that given what our Church believes, the Church can't justify what happened to Tiller.
Antonio A. Obregón |
|
|
|
Antonio A
Maryhead
825 Posts |
Posted - Jun 14 2009 : 8:55:24 PM
|
Hi Justin,
I'm not the enemy, just a Catholic talking or writing to another Catholic.
Your quotes from the Old Testament I read, yet is that the way our Church prescribes for us to fight evil? What does Paul mean when he says we are fighting powers and principalities? I think those words lead us to realize we are engaged in an spiritual warfare and that seems to be the way our Church wants us to fight evil.
Like you and Chris, I also have heavy questions. Pius XII wanted World War II to stop and I believe that if God had listened to his prayers we would all be speaking German today. We fought the Crusades to rescue the Holy Land from men who would not allow us to go to our holy places. Many died in the name of Christ yet the Prince of Peace tell us we must love and pray for our enemies but nowhere do I find Him saying we should kill them.
I find the Tiller case fascinating because it has brought up all these moral issues for us to search with passion and yet never forgetting the "Christian" name we are answerable to.
Antonio A. Obregón |
Edited by - Antonio A on Jun 14 2009 8:57:19 PM |
|
|
|
Topic |
|
|
|
George Tiller "the killer" Reaps
