Praising a murderer as a saint

I am not normally at a loss for words, but when I read these testimonials in the Washington Times from individuals who claim to be believers in God praising a man who murdered children for profit, I was simply stunned. I expect all manner of excuses for perversity from people like this, I expect to hear all manner of man-made heresies peddled as the Gospel, I even expected to hear some politically charged denunciations but to defend a man who murders innocents as a “saint” and a champion of human rights? Read these quotes and weep for the people who can say these sorts of things…

"This is about the loss of a man who was a saint and a martyr," she said in an interview before the service. "He was a prayerful man who put his life at risk to protect others and died for it. People are in shock, outrage and mourning. They need a place to go."

the Very Rev. Katherine Ragsdale, president of Episcopal Divinity School

Reconstructionist Rabbi Arthur Waskow of the Philadelphia-based Shalom Center said Dr. Tiller "joins the list of martyrs for ethical decency and human rights, killed for healing with compassion."

The rabbi said Dr. Tiller was "a religious martyr in the fullest classical sense, killed in his own church as he arrived to worship, killed for acting in accord with his religious commitments and his moral and ethical choices."

Rabbi Arthur Waskow of the Shalom Center

"He was a hero to many abortion clinic workers, who were aware of his incredible courage and bravery," Ms. Turner said. "I knew him personally, so this will be a service of mourning for his wonderful life. He is the first abortion provider to put a chapel inside his clinic, and he had a chaplain on duty to work with all of his patients."

Rev. Rebecca Turner, a Disciples of Christ minister

I will agree with Mr. Waskow when he described George Tiller as a religious martyr. Not a martyr for being a healer, or acting for ethical decency, but a martyr for a religion where children are not a blessing to embrace, but a curse to be discarded like a paper plate.

If only these people could shed one tear, if only they could utter one word of sympathy, light one candle, have one vigil, offer one prayer for the millions of babies slain on the bloody altar of choice.

This brings to mind a very apt Scripture, one that is reflected ever more in our modern culture as it slips in moral ruin and depravity.

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

(Romans 1: 28-32, emp. add.)