There are way too many stupid things being said about the shooting at the Planned Parenthood clinic in CO.
There is the criticism that we would readily label a nut shouting Alahu Akbar a Muslim terrorist but won’t label this man a Christian terrorist.
That isn’t even good satire. It’s just dumb. There is certainly a frightening and problematic tendency of some on the right to assume that Islam is terrorist at its core and to fear all Muslims. But to criticize the willingness to call religiously inspired Islamic terrorism what it is and claim that the CO shooter it somehow the Christian version of that is…well, I can’t believe it even needs an answer.
Violent fundamentalist Muslims have an arguably warped interpretive model of Islam that motivates their actions. Still they know the Quran inside and out. They use it to motivate and justify the wickedness they perpetrate.
Note: I originally stated, “The CO shooter has quite possibly never cracked open a Bible.” Initial reports that I had followed stated that he was frequently involved in domestic violence and not particularly religious or especially anti-abortion prior to the shooting. Evidently this was inaccurate. It seems that he was some extreme Antinomian, which I would still argue has no basis in scripture or anything that can be called Christian in the historical and orthodox sense. That said, I would still make the case that while there are certainly many Muslims who denounce violent radicals, there really is a large movement–in some instances practically entire nations–that is organized and theologically and historically supported in the violent interpretation of Islam. Meanwhile the next statement is still generally valid.
Our Christian fundamentalists typically manifest their evil interpretive approach in various ways like protesting funerals or saying nasty things in blogs and newspaper interviews, but not typically by building armies, beheading people, and crucifying fathers while raping wives and children in front of their slowly dying bodies. I’m sorry, there just isn’t a moral equivalent there. (Another required change) While the CO shooter evidently did make some declaration about judgment of God, there is no armed group of Christians willing to take the credit and threatening the security of entire nations.
As for the current media story, well, I am glad that the press is willing to report the tragedy of three people killed in a Planned Parenthood clinic. It is sad when any person meets a violent death, because every person was made in the image of God and is loved by God. I just wish the media would take the time to mention the millions of other people who are murdered in Planned Parenthood clinics on a daily basis. Those murders are just as evil as the ones committed by Muslim terrorists in Syria and that insane shooter in CO.
Sadly, most of our American mainstream media is populated by bigots who are committed only to the well being of that “small but arrogant oligarchy of those who happen to be walking about,” as Chesterton put it. They will continue to cover up the horror and evil of what Planned Parenthood is doing because the victims of PP’s crime have no voice.
So, while we grieve and pray for the victims of the CO shooting, we cannot cease to call the murder of the unborn what it is: bloody, violent, and wicked murder.
We will not be silenced no matter how much the bigots in the media try to blame pro-life Christians for the actions of the gunman in CO, because frankly that is a lie.
Puddleglum Contra Mundum 