What are pro-life activists saying about the murder of pro-life activist James Pouillon?

Mark Browne, M.Ed, a speech-language pathologist from Melbourne, Florida offered this expert comment: “Frank Schaeffer’s hateful demonizing speech against pro-lifers has created a culture where such things can occur, with little fanfare from the media.”

Sal Lonberg, an ornithologist from Palm Bay, Florida said, “Like the vast majority of pro-life advocates, Jim was non-violent and never condoned violence. The great irony here is that the same people who rushed to canonize Tiller the Killer have remained deafeningly silent and have even celebrated the death of this gentle soul.”

Carol Matthews, a scientist at Kennedy Space Center, was a bit more austere: “‘Where do we go from here?’ As Dr. Martin Luther King once said: ‘When our days become dreary with low hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice. Let us realize that William Cullen Bryant is right: “Truth crushed to earth will rise again.” Let us go out realizing that the Bible is right: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” This is our hope for the future, and with this faith we will be able to sing in some not too distant tomorrow with a cosmic past tense, “We have overcome, we have overcome, deep in my heart, I did believe we would overcome.”’”

The number of pro-abortion related homicides is huge. It’s not surprising that a profession that makes it’s living from legalized child murder has a huge number of homicide convictions among its practitioners. There have been other pro-lifers besides Pouillon who have been murdered as well. It’s usually a blip on the radar screen of liberal journalism so most people don’t know about this.

Huntsville, Alabama — In 1993, pro-abortion activist Eileen Orstein Janezic murdered pro-life activist minister and radio talk show host Jerry Simon in Huntsville, Alabama. After killing Simon, she held police at bay with a pistol for six hours while spouting quotes from Anton LaVey’s “Satanic Bible.” In October 1994, a jury found her guilty of murder, and she was sentenced to life in prison.

Monterey, Tennessee – On the morning of October 19, 1998, pro-abortionist Byron Looper, a Monterey, Tennessee county property assessor running against pro-life state Senator Tommy Burks, shot Burks in the left eye with a large-caliber handgun near a pumpkin patch where he planned to take schoolchildren on a hayride that same day. A witness said that Looper told him after the murder that “I did it, man, I did it! I killed that dude!” In 2000, Looper was convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole. *

Owosso, Michigan – James Pouillon, 63, was killed Friday morning while protesting across the street from a high school in Owosso, about 70 miles northwest of Detroit. Pouillon was in his usual spot holding a sign that pictured a chubby-cheeked baby with the word “LIFE” on one side and an image of an aborted fetus with the word “ABORTION” on the other. Authorities allege Harlan Drake, 33, of Owosso pulled up to Pouillon in a truck and opened fire. Prosecutors say Pouillon’s methods irritated Drake, particularly when used near the high school. Drake also is accused of killing a local business owner earlier that day.

This Web site shows detailed state-by-state and city-by-city documentation of more than 8,000 incidents of pro-abortion violence and lawbreaking. In contrast, there have been nine homicides committed in anti-abortion related incidents: four doctors and five abortion clinic workers. People on both sides of the debate are trying to argue that these were mentally unbalanced people whose actions do not represent the advocacy of either pro-life or abortion rights. For the sake of non-argument, I agree with that statement.

But where do we go from here?

From 1993 to 2000, I lived in and later owned a house directly across the street from one of America’s most notorious abortion clinics, Aware Woman Center for Choice. The trustee of the property prior to my purchase was the National Director of Operation Rescue, Keith Tucci. Keith once told me that before he got involved in Operation Rescue in the late 1980s, he confronted its founder Randall Terry with a serious question, “Do you think it is possible that anyone could die as a result of direct action against abortion clinics?”

Randall said without hesitation that it would likely happen. The Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was a peaceful movement, he reasoned, which encouraged direct action similar to that of Operation Rescue. Numerous arrests occurred. Yet although it is known for being a peaceful protest movement, many deaths on either side occurred as tensions rose and even the peaceful protesters sometimes broke with the pledge to non-violence advocated by Dr. Martin Luther King. In addition, 40 Civil Rights advocates were murdered.

This memorial in Montgomery, Alabama is dedicated to the 40 Civil Rights advocates who were murdered including Dr. Martin Luther King.

Not many people know this, but Operation Rescue, and the various pro-life resistance movements that still go on today at abortion clinics, have formed the largest civil disobedience (we prefer the term “biblical obedience”) movement in history. I was arrested five times from 1989 to 1996. I know other pro-lifers with dozens of arrests for their peaceful protest of child killing. In all there have been over 75,000 pro-life activists arrested for their peaceful resistance to child killing. In all that confrontation, it is amazing that more people have not been killed. In the time that I lived across from Aware Woman until now, I have known of many pro-lifers who have received death threats and others who have been attacked, such as Patte Smith who made this video of a doctor who assailed her while she was sidewalk counseling at Orlando Women’s Center.

Those holding pro-life signs along US Highway 1 often had oncoming cars swerve in their direction honking their horns at them. My property was vandalized several times. What do we expect? We are in a war. We strive to use prayer and the preaching of the Gospel as the weapons of our warfare. But occasionally this real spiritual war is going to spill over into physical violence, which is always detrimental to the pro-life cause no matter who is harmed. The great irony is that there have been far many more murders, acts of violence and other illegal acts by pro-abortionists. But the media won’t cover it because it rocks their worldview. Into the fray steps Frank Schaeffer.

“And when you look at what happened to Dr. Tiller, there’s a direct line connecting the rhetoric that I was part of as a young man and this murder. And so people like me are responsible for what we said and what we did and the way we raised the temperature on this debate out of all bounds. And so when O’Reilly talks about the fact that these people of the far left are against Fox or against him or trying to muzzle debate, he’s telling a lie. I am not a member of the far right. Until I voted for Barack Obama in the last election I was a lifelong Republican and I am still pro-life. I also believe abortion should be legal, but I agree with Barack Obama when he says we ought to find ways to help women, help children, give contraceptives, sex education to lessen the number of abortions. I think abortion is a tragedy. But I also think that pretending that you can call abortion murder and Tiller the baby killer, etc., etc., etc. and that these words don’t have an impact is crazy. So this is what helps unhinge a society, talking like that. And I apologize and I will apologize again. I am sorry for what I did.”

_Question:—*_* When Frank Schaefer says that pro-lifers who call abortion “murder” are “unhinged” and “responsible” for Tiller’s death, can we also draw a direct line between those angry words and the death of our gentle friend, James Pouillon?

_Question:—*_* When Frank Schaeffer says, “I am still pro-life” what does that mean? Does it mean that he dislikes abortion because it is messy and distasteful? Or does he oppose abortion because it is the wanton taking of an innocent baby boy or girl in violation of God’s commandment, “You shall not murder”?

In the next installment of “Frank Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up?” I’ll examine the discontinuity of Franks’ so-called “pro-life” stance and explain further why he really needs to shut up.