For immediate release:
The Episcopal Women’s Caucus joins people of faith everywhere in our shock and deep sadness at the violent murder of Dr. George Tiller, who was gunned down Sunday morning, the Day of Pentecost, at The Reformation Lutheran
Church, where he was a long time member.Dr. Tiller was an internationally known champion of the reproductive rights of women. His senseless, untimely death is a cruel loss to his immediate family, his church family and religious people everywhere who understand
that freedom of choice is a cultural and political reflection of the spiritual gift of free will which God bestows upon each and every one of us.The comfort of the Christian faith is that we are assured of Dr. Tiller’s place in the eternal and loving embrace of Jesus. Our prayers are with Dr. Tiller’s family, who grieve his loss as well as with his church family, who are also deeply affected and traumatized by his murder in their sanctuary.
We pray also for his murder, that healing and reconciliation may begin.
We deplore the ‘hate speech’ and inflammatory rhetoric which ultimately leads to these violent acts We pray that we might find a way past our passionately held beliefs, on either side of the great divide of this issue, and into a path of mercy, justice and peace – a peace which passes all human understanding.
Further, we pray that ‘respect for life’ includes respect for the life of every woman as well as all those whose lives are dedicated to the respectful and valiant cause of securing freedom of choice for all women.
Contacts:
(the Rev’d Dr.) Elizabeth Kaeton, President, EWC
Ms. Karen D. Bota, Editor, Ruach
Sick people.
The Swan spreads her wings…thanks for making my day Fr.Matt.
Intercessor
Vile. What a Christian priest would note is the tragic fact that Dr. Tiller was not given the opportunity to confess his sins and repent, prior to his murder.
It passes all human understanding how factional bigots like these can deny the scientific, moral and spiritual questions of whether or not there is life in the womb and, if so, when it is entitled to the community’s protection.
Smoke blowers. Obfuscators. People with dinged up, unhealed opposite-gender relationships that make them incapable of teaching or leading a truly diverse and inclusive church.
Hate? Drips off of every syllable they put out.
What’s funny is, contra the progressive mantra that “we just get to know the LGBT”, I used to believe these folks until I got to know them in seminary and TEC bureaucracy. Make no mistake, these people are full of unhealed wounds and are working out their hate on the world.
The comfort of the Christian faith is that we are assured of Dr. Tiller’s place in the eternal and loving embrace of Jesus.
I don’t understand this. I pray for Dr. Tiller’s soul but judgment is for the Lord to declare and is not in the hands of even such an esteemed body as the Episcopal Women’s Caucus.
NB&S;(#2),
The tragedy, my friend, is not that he was not given the opportunity to confess his sins and repent, the tragedy, in my view, is that his murder of some 60 thousand babies was apparently not considered a sin in his church, as it is not in many quarters of TEC, including the seminary in Cambridge, where abortion is considered a blessing. How does one confess and repent to committing a blessing?
Perhaps for the EWC anyone who perfoms abortions and attends a church is automatically a Christian and embraced by God.
I agree with you, driver. It’s presumptious.
Justification by infanticide alone.
Well, I do feel so much better now that I know Elizabeth Kaeton has more than one subject to talk about-in addition to homosexuality, of course. <sigh>
We pray that we might find a way past our passionately held beliefs, on either side of the great divide of this issue, and into a path of mercy, justice and peace – a peace which passes all human understanding.
They have healed the brokenness of My people superficially, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ but there is no peace. Jeremiah 6:14
Did you have to post this right before I go to bed? My enemies surround me!
Psalm 4:8
I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.
Don’t forget, if I may use Catholic parlance a minute, these folks think he was a martyr, and so received the “baptism of blood”, which takes him straight to heaven. But I agree, it’s pure presumption to say any such thing, one way or another. He’s in God’s hands, that much we do know.
It’s kind of a secondary issue, but I have been noticing an increasing trend - and especially with this Tiller thing - of liberals really trying to stop free speech.
I saw when Jim Naughton posted about the Tiller murder, one of the first things he mentioned was Bill O’Reilly’s criticism of Tiller. I have read in a few instances where liberals think O’Reilly is basically responsible for the murder. I saw the same kind of talk at Fr. Jake / Terry Martin’s old blog, where the argument was continually made that those who were against homosexual sex were should be prosecuted as murderers.
When I was a kid (not that long ago, I am a gen-x er), it was the conservatives that supported censorship - mostly of pornography, music, and video games. At the time I was liberal, and thought that this was un-American and paternalistic. Now it is the liberals who support censorship, but an even more scary kind of censorship - political and religious speech.
It looks like liberals - once champions of free speech - are now building up a case to censor anti-abortion and anti-homosexual thoughts and words. The liberal American notion of “I may not agree with what you say, but I will die fighting for your right to say it” is basically dead, and a new liberal fascism is taking form.
DoW
#8 FenelonSpoke - Lesbianism and abortion are part and parcel. All about denying God’s design, separating male and female as much as possible. Turning reproduction into an “individual” matter is about as far from the Biblical understanding as one can get.
Let me say again the murder is in IMO wickedly sinful and I have prayed for Dr. Tiller’s soul, for his murderer and their families.
Yet not even the ELCA (his own church) presumed to declare the truth of Dr. Tiller’s relationship to the Lord in their statement on his wicked murder. (Let alone the LCMS from which Dr. Tiller was excommunicate). I pray for his soul.
I begone to see that, Rev, Fountain-at least in some cases.
My post was in the vein of sarcasm. I should not be so sarcastic.
Maybe I haven’t read enough of Kaeton but I see her vision of Christianity as a “social service” agency most directly connected with gay rights and abortion rights with a bit of a overlay of Jesus as a figurehead. Perhaps that is not fair to her, but that is the impression I get.
The complicity of the churches which champion Tiller’s killing of the unborn and all other abortionists surely must leave them equally (if not more) standing condemned before the Lord.
The rocks will not hide them.
That women’s caucus mindset sounds remarkably like what the mindset of a similar organization of women who rationalized slavery in the 1800s, would have sounded like. They have their excuses for their willing indifference to what scripture actually says, and the only things that truly matters to them is what profits them.
The Executive Council of TEC joined the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, but the House of Bishops refused to address the issue by tabling it. Whether the bishops did not want to stand up to the Executive Council or to their parishioners, I cannot say.
Now Rev. Kaeton creates another theological fact on the ground by passing judgment on Dr. Tiller’s eternal soul. Will her bishop or the House of Bishops question the propriety of this statement? Will they stand against universalism or allow the continued redefinition of the faith received?
My prayers for Dr. Tiller’s family and his soul; and for all the children who have died by abortion and have returned to their Father in Heaven.
Our churches need an annual service of prayer and healing for the mothers of the children who were not wanted, and for those who have been complacent in finding ways for those children to live. God created all of us at conception, and we must respect the dignity of human life then to natural death. Otherwise God is not important; _my_ choice is important!
If it is our choice to abort a child to their death, we can set value of life at any age. We have taken the affirmation of life from God and have made it our choice. If you terminate the children, you can exterminate the elderly, the disabled in mind or body, or just the politically incorrect. You can have managed care for those most productive to society.
Folks, pregnancy is not a sexually transmitted disease. A pregnancy isn’t a problem, if we affirm it as part of God’s plan. Please pray for the unwanted children and include their plight in your corporate prayers at Church.
The Episcopal Women’s Caucus? My faith is in Christ. Who are they? God put them here for a purpose. Without groups like EWC making their pronouncements and the death of Dr. Tiller, the slaughter would remain hidden. Rejoice, everyone is going to know who is pushing late-term abortion. Talk it up!
The conversations on the HOB/D list as led by Elizabeth Keaton are sickening. Thank God for Bishop Howe who injects a very small amount of sanity and orthodox Christianity into the diatribe.
Putting aside all the religious / moral aspects of abortion, someone tell me how is it even logical that if someone kills an unborn child against the will of the mother, that person can be charged and found guilty of murder. Yet if a mother agrees to the death of her unborn child, she and the doctor who commits the killing are not in violation of the law. Please explain, I don’t get it!
#3 & #13 Fr. Timothy:
I believe you hit the nail firmly on the head, and it sounds like we had similar experiences in a seminary of TEO.
#13 DoW, My Gen X friend:
Perhaps that liberal notion of not agreeing with what is said but dying for the persons right to say to say it has come full circle. I say that as being an immigrant myself it exactly word for word what I hear espoused by my USMC and other military friends. Ironic if it wasn’t what I as an American believe myself.
Then again I am probably damned already for watching Bill O’Reilly and frequently agreeing with him (as is my God given right).
Orate Fratres (et sanctimonialis)
Take a look across the pond and see how free speech has been washed down the toilet in the UK, and being a Christian becomes closer and closer to being a crime. I live in Alameda (home of the new curriculum for wee ones… sigh) and the warning flags are already out on the Left Coast
I pray for Dr. Tiller’s soul, and I pray for the souls of those whom he affected, but to declare him a martyr is beyond the pale for me.
Alasdair
These women don’t speak for me:
His senseless, untimely death is a cruel loss to ... religious people everywhere who understand that freedom of choice is a cultural and political reflection of the spiritual gift of free will which God bestows upon each and every one of us.
They remind me of the woman and the man in the Garden, who ate of the forbidden fruit that they might be like God. Their choice led to the horror reflected in this modern choice to kill living humans before birth. Surely this is a serious theological error on the part of the Womens’ Caucus.
Yes - you are right - to sin is precisely to choose wrongly.
If Episcopal Women’s Caucus were right individuals would never sin. Actions which we do not freely choose cannot be our own sinful actions and actions which are freely chosen are, apparently by definition, not sinful since free will is God given.
It’s amazing that such theological nonsense can be put forward. However one suspects that the rhetoric is more driven by the desire to gesture towards the “pro choice” slogan than any desire to reflect on Christian theology.
Katherine,
These women don’t speak for me either, and I don’t think they speak for most women but they seem to have made their way to power in the Episcopal church by presuming to speak for us and by actually denigrating the importance of women as mothers.
It is terribly wrong that the pro-life movement (NOEL) was driven from the Episcopal church, and that the RCRC was recognized by TEC, and now it seems that the Women’s Caucus worships the memory of Dr. Tiller because he was willing do anything, even destroy a baby, in order to be sure that a woman’s absolute power over that baby remains intact. Neither Dr. Tiller or his killer should be exalted.
Thou shalt not kill.
Exodus 21:13
This “humans,” and I use the description with some trepidation, in the EWC are beyond insane. I am beginning to think more and more that only demonic possesseion could lead to statements proclaiming that the murderer of thousands of innocent unborn babies is embraced by Christ. Didn’t Christ say something about “spewing” from His mouth? This is much more accurate.
Being an Aussie I love the connotation of the Episcopal Women’s Caucus for short
EWC
Maybe it means Episcopal WC ( assuming you know what a WC is?????)
I would tend to think it might be true of the beliefs of Ms Kaeton, I couldn’t call her a Rev nor a Dr.. note I said her beliefs. God help those she “teaches”
This letter sounds like something Screwtape wrote.
On another topic - how can one affirm that every individual has absolute freedom of the will, and also that everyone will be in heaven? If people are sovereignly free, some will choose to stay away from God.
#2 - Vile. What a Christian priest would note is the tragic fact that Dr. Tiller was not given the opportunity to confess his sins and repent, prior to his murder.
You must not be an Episcopalian. There is no sin in TEC; sin is an outdated concept carried on by orthodox believers that haven’t experienced that “Jesus loves you just the way you are” stuff.
EK is a sick individual!
Fr K, it all depends on why you believe life has value.
If you believe life has value, simply because it is a gift from God you will believe taking a life is wrong except for under very specific circumstances such as war or self defense or the just application of the death penalty.
However if you think the value of life lies not in that life itself but in how it is objectified by another the death of a few million Jews and preborn babies or the euthanasia of the disabled, the elderly, the terminally ill are no great loss. Because their lives only mattered in relation to another. And if that relation becomes adverserial (sp) will exile might work but death is so much more definite. Does their life present a threat to the State, or the job prospects of the mother, or the freedom of their family? One must weigh these things and if the cause of this is found wanting the Tiller’s of the world will extend their black gloved hands in sympathy. Because surely such a small death is of no consequence.
From whence? What’s the cite?
However if you think the value of life lies not in that life itself but in how it is objectified by another the death of a few million Jews and preborn babies or the euthanasia of the disabled, the elderly, the terminally ill are no great loss.
Exactly right. When you remove the Christian worldview and replace it with that of postmodernism or secular humanism then we are simply creatures or just “stuff.”
There are really only two reasons for keeping “stuff” - because it’s pretty or because it is useful to us. When something is neither attractive nor usefull, we throw it away because it has no inherent value apart from those characteristics (thus Terri Schiavo)
john1, I would check Ms. Kaeton’s site. I would imagine that Mr. Griffith would prefer not to link there.
I would prefer it too, frankly.
It looks like liberals - once champions of free speech - are now building up a case to censor anti-abortion and anti-homosexual thoughts and words.
Sadly, for some, the only “free” speech that is tolerable is their own. I completely loathe attempts to muzzle free speech - wherever they come from. And the hypocrisy of those who defend it when their own speech was in danger and turn around and try to muzzle voices they don’t want to hear is deeply offensive to me.
I pray for Dr. Tiller’s soul but judgment is for the Lord to declare
Amen, driver8.
One thing I don’t get is why some (a lot of?) lesbians are soooooo pro-abortion. I mean, why pick that as your issue?
It would appear from their own words that Rev. Kaeton and Ms. Bota are as morally-deranged as was Dr. Tiller. They apparently have no sympathy for the 60,000+ babies who were slaughtered in Tiller’s clinic. All their sympathy is for Tiller’s family which lived very well for over 30 years off the proceeds of mass murder. Another nail in the TEC coffin.
PapaJ (37),
The ELCA lived off it too, and this is a nail in their coffin. They are yet to express sympathy and remorse for what he has done to the lives of those children.
They are just full of weasel words.
Nasty, Brutish and Short (36) - I’ve wondered about that too.
Ah, yet another shining example of Ke-Ke’s “Me-Ology”.
I wonder what her heaven looks like? I think StandFirm might already be her Hell! Ha!
KTF!...mrb
The EWC, like TEC itself, worships death. This is just an extension of that worship.
NBS and Oscewicee -
Abortion and lack of acceptance of the gay lifestyle are both the product of a misogynistic and paternalistic society where women are viewed as women and not as men.
Okay, I think I got at least part of that right.
Yes, they believe they have the same root cause.
The comfort of the Christian faith is that we are assured of Dr. Tiller’s place in the eternal and loving embrace of Jesus.
I can’t find anything in my Bible that supports this statement.
Nasty, Brutish and Short (#36): Because babies are a harm and burden inflicted by men seeking to dominate women.
I can’t find anything in my Bible that supports this statement.
I think they’ve mistaken God and Santa Claus, Jim:
God is an elderly or, at any rate, middle-aged mate, a stern fellow, patriarchal rather than paternal and a great believer in rules and regulations. He holds men strictly accountable for their actions. He has little apparent concern for the material well-being of the disadvantaged. He is politically connected, socially powerful and holds the mortgage on literally everything in the world. God is difficult. God is unsentimental. It is very hard to get into God’s heavenly country club.
Santa Claus is another matter. He’s cute. He’s nonthreatening. He’s always cheerful. And he loves animals. He may know who’s been naughty and who’s been nice, but he never does anything about it. He gives everyone everything they want without thought of a quid pro quo. He works hard for charities, and he’s famously generous to the poor. Santa Claus is preferable to God in every way but one: There is no such thing as Santa Claus.
http://home.earthlink.net/~sscutchen/Quotes/on_god_and_santa_claus.htm
I don’t want to compare God to either a “mate” or Santa Claus. And yes, I do think God has some concern for the materially disadvantaged. The prophets believed he did.
But yes, I do know a number of people who seem to regard God as being rather like Santa Claus or like the Pillsbury Dough Boy. Soft, cute and squishy. In his book, The Divine Comspiracy, Dallas Willard refers to people who think of God as a “dim grandfatherly type who doesn’t really care as long as the young people are enjoying themselves.”
I just looked up your quote. That was P.J, O ‘Rourke’s reference to God being a Republican. I think O’Rourke can be a very witty man. However, I don’t think God is a Republican….or a Democrat.
I think God is an Independent. :^)
NBS—To add to what Jim wrote, remember that the gay-rights idea of sex is not at all about reproduction (obviously!)—it is, first and foremost, about pleasure, and things that get in the way of that, like little babies, are sometimes a problem. I believe this is all part of the same mindset that would love to see sex further and further seperated from reproduction—their ideal being something approximating that found in Huxley’s “Brave New World” where the two have been fully divided—babies come from machines, which in turn are controlled by the state. This is why, in my view, orthodox Anglicans should look hard at the Catholic teaching on natural law and sex. But I’ll leave it at that.
I don’t think we can assume that the “ECW” is connected to the “Episcopal Women’s Caucus”, I hope that they are not.
Would someone please let us know if the “Episcopal Women’s Caucus” is in any way connected to the “ECW” (Episcopal Church Women) organization?
I am not sure what the point of this conversation is. It all seems to me like 42 posts (there are a few that are actually commenting on the actual document - most are just agreeing with the “sick people” statement) that offer sarcastic and vicious judgements on Eliz Kaeton. What did you expect this organization to say?
Geez - this site is just getting to be plain, old mean. Mean. Not funny. Mean. What sets all of you apart from how the other team speaks of you all? Not much, as far as I can read. And this is after reading most of the comments on the Tiller-related threads. I will no longer recommend Stand Firm as a helpful site for those people who want to know more about this current Anglican/Episcopal situation.
I would appreciate you unsubscribing me.
Dana Henry
Sewickley, PA
Oh, dear; How devastating for SFIF that you find some comments “mean”. I find Elizabeth Kaeton lifting up Tiller as a Saint and martyr objectionable. I find the fact that Dr. Tiller perfomed abortions on infants in the womb in the second trimester objectionable. I find it objectionable that some nutcase killed him.
No, I didn’t expect Elizabeth Kaeton to say anything different; That’s the sad part.
Pardon me; I made a mistake. It was the
“abortion is a blessing lady” Rev, Ragsdale that called Tiller a “saint and a martyr,” not Elizabeth Kaeton. She’s just assured that by his actions, he’s in the eternal presence of Jesus. I find that comment presumptous. Does it surprise me? No.
Dana, I don’t really think you can get a feeling for the whole “Anglican/Episcopal situation” without reading StandFirm.
I think that things are getting a little more strident on both sides, actually.
Dana, was it just this thread, or was this just the straw that broke the camel’s back?
I don’t think it’s mean to point out that as a consequence of Tiller’s actions and Keaton’s endorsement of same, that innocent babies end up dead. Pointing that out—stridently—would seem to me to be the least one can do.
Perhaps if Dr. Tiller had had more Christian faith himself, he’d still be alive today.
if he had had more Christian faith he would not have made his living and supported his family by killing babies
The liberals are in denial that millions of babies and now Dr. Tiller have been killed by their agenda. By raising him to sainthood, they try to justify what their agenda has led to, and try to blame everyone else for what they have done. They are sick.
It is not an issue of whether Roeder’s actions were right or wrong. Tiller was killed because he killed defenseless babies. It just took someone unstable to act, because those around him were to complacent or scared to take on liberalism.
The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod excommunicated Tiller. Now, ELCA must explain to their membership why their greeter and usher at Reformation Lutheran Church was one of the three late-term abortionists in the country. So far, they have been slippery weasels. They obviously don’t have the backbone of Martin Luther.
RE: “I am not sure what the point of this conversation is.”
Hi Dana—I’m sorry you don’t see the point. The point of this thread is, I suspect, to highlight that the leaders of the EWC make the farcical claim that “inflammatory rhetoric”—that is, pointing out that abortion is murder—leads to murder, rather like the anti-slavery forces “inflammatory rhetoric” of protest, I suppose, leads to John Brown. And that they assured Dr. Tiller’s place in heaven—for reasons I can’t fathom why. And then the final point of the post appears to have been to assert that those same leaders are “sick people.”
It appears that you don’t agree with those above points.
I understand—although I certainly agree with them.
Re: unsubscribing, please see this helpful link:
http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/11236/#remove
If you have any other questions, feel free to email Greg using your Private Message center—you can find directions to using the PM center at the same “Help” thread that I pointed you to above.
Since this thread isn’t about how mean SF is, I’d appreciate it if all commenters would get back on topic, please, now that Dana’s needs are addressed and she has a means of privately dealing with her requests.
Thanks.
“The Episcopal Women’s Caucus” does not speak for “Women” or the “Episcopal Church” they are simply a “caucus” and they speak for themselves. I hope that the “ECW” (Episcopal Church Women) does not bow to the pressure that they wish to exert.
cau·cus [káwkəss]
n (plural cau·cus·es)
1. political meeting: closed meeting of people from one political party, especially a local meeting to select delegates or candidates
2. special-interest group: a group of people, often within a larger group, for example, a legislative assembly, who unite to promote a particular policy or particular interests
One searches for where to begin reflecting on this. He performed late term abortions, but was attending a Christian church? The Episcopal Church through Katie the Lawless (KJS) rightly deplores the fact of his murder, but defends his profession? Abortion is almost always at a very minimum gravely sinful (as, of course, is murder), and those who are directly responsible for it in a state of grave sin. Even with all the logical and linguistic gymnastics I can conceive of, I still find it impossible to defend anything but Dr. Tiller’s right to live. He certainly did not defend even that in the case of the babies he killed. Yes, his killer has earned our condemnation for his act, but in performing late term (or any other) abortion, I feel that Dr. Tiller voided any claim to being a practicing Christian. Fortunately for us all, that decision belongs to a loving God.
(bolding mine)
We pray that we might find a way past our passionately held beliefs, on either side of the great divide of this issue, and into a path of mercy, justice and peace – a peace which passes all human understanding.
Now who wants us to “check our brains at the door”?