A doctor was assassinated in Wichita, KS by a religious fanatic and cold blooded killer. His name was Dr. George Tiller. But who killed Dr. Tiller?
Was it the gunman alone?
Hardly.
Ever since the Roe v Wade decision by the Supreme Court made abortion safe and legal, the nation has endured an endless, vitriolic campaign of harrassment against abortion led by the Roman Catholic Church and Fundamentalist Protestants.
This is an indisputable fact. For decades these institutions have drilled into the heads of their flocks that those who participate in any way in any abortion are "murderers" and "baby killers".
This would include the mothers as well as the doctors and all the other healthcare workers involved.
They founded the anti-abortion movement, they have grown it, they have taken credit for it, they have led it, they have exhorted it, they have driven it, they have funded it, they have been responsible for continuing it long after the legal question was decided and put to rest for the vast majority of our people--even those who so blindly follow them.
They have harrassed doctors, nurses, pregnant women and anyone else who happened to have business in any office or building that provided abortion services or even advice about where to find abortion services.
Gore drenched pictures of mangled fetuses in garbage pales, swastikas, and all manner of shrill visual and audio props have been shoved in the faces of any passers by and those who enter the buildings housing such offices.
These props (provided by the religiously motivated opposition to abortion) are used by misguided zealots whose hearts and minds are often filled with so much love for Jesus and the unborn that they lose sight of any boundaries of propriety in their behavior and their obsessive harrassment of people who are seeking help for a legal and safe medical procedure.
More than once this zealotry has turned criminally violent. These narrow-minded mobs never tire of hurling invectives and the worst sorts of bile at anyone or any institution that is connected in any way to an abortion provider.
The clergy of these two organizations regularly exhort their blinded followers to continue the harrassment outside the clinics, the extremist, hateful and reckless rhetoric.
They let the sheep do the dirty work for the shepherds and then when one of those sheep literally goes ballistic they loudly proclaim their opposition to any such activity despite the fact that they have been callling men like Dr. Tiller "mass murderers" and "baby killers" for decades and thus poisoning our entire public life for nearly 40 years over their prescientific religious dogmatic extremism.
Every time a man like Dr. Tiller has been killed, the "pro-life movement" makes pro forma condemnation of the murderers of a human being and then the very next day go right back to inciting the very violence they claim to oppose. It is sickening. It is literally, killing people. It has got to be put to an end.
The so called "pro-life movement" and it's religious leaders need to bring an immediate halt to the unending, venomous, harrassment of women, their doctors and healthcare workers they have been engaged in now for decades.
And yes, that means that the right wing fundamentalist Protestant preachers need to go on tv and openly and loudly proclaim their opposition to any further verbal or symbolic harrassment at clinics and offices and they need specifically to call for an immediate end to the harrassment at clinics using the words murder, murderer, mass murderer, baby killers and so on and so does the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic church.
The despicalbe and irresponsible behavior they have engaged in has led to this shocking murder today of Dr. Tiller.
Both sets of religious leaders and the non-clergy leadership of the anti-abortion mob are culpable in the murder of Dr. Tiller for exhorting their followers to such extremes for decades, driving them to near frenzy in their religious condemnation of a medical procedure long made legal and so the minimum they can do is bring an immediate halt to the endless and quite pointless harrassment and extremist rhetoric they have engaged in themselves and encouraged in others that has now led to yet another sickening murder of a doctor simply because he did not share their religious beliefs.
So who killed Dr. Tiller? It is time for the religious leaders who have brought us to this point to look in the mirror to find the killer. Everyone knows who really killed Dr. Tiller.
To the murderers I say, blood is on your hands and it is from the actual murder of a living, breathing, full grown, innocent man whose life was dedicated to helping others though your dogmatic religious blindness condems him for it.
Those who have led the crazed anti-abortionists and have incited them to this kind of violence will attempt to wash their hands of this act, but I don't think simply distancing themselves from the action of the man who pulled the trigger is fooling anyone any longer.
No one is fooled Reverend.
No one is fooled Father.
The time for your dishonet distancing of yoursevles from the logical outcome of all your rhetoric is over.
Ultimately, you are guilty of this crime and need to take responsibility for the murder you have caused to be committed in your names and in the name of Jesus.
Confess and repent before you kill another innocent man or woman and disgrace yourselves any further and before you bring further disgrace to your churches.
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