On Sunday, we learned of the fatal shooting of abortionist George Tiller at his church in Wichita, Kan.

According to national news media reports, Tiller provided late-term abortions at his clinic, Women’s Health Care Services, in Wichita. The 67-year-old was one of the few people still offering such abortions in the country.

A motive for the shooting was not immediately known, but it’s probably safe to assume that Tiller was targeted because of how he makes his living. His clinic has been bombed and vandalized in the past, and he still sported gunshot wounds in both his arms from a 1993 shooting. He had guards on duty at his clinic, and an advanced security system at home. According to his friends and colleagues quoted in the story, he knew “he could be a target at any time.”

Scott Roeder, from the Kansas City area, is being held without bail in connection with the shooting.

As disgusting as I think the practice of abortion is, equally disgusting is the murder of a husband, father and grandfather while he was serving as an usher at his church. The act of taking a man’s life does an exceedingly poor job of making the point that all unborn children deserve a chance at life. It is, as one colleague of Tiller’s put it to CNN, “the ultimate backwardness.”

Kansas law generally allows abortions, even into the third trimester, as long as the physician determines that the fetus isn’t viable or if two physicians both determine that an abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother.

Hundreds of thousands of people throughout America, myself included, support an unborn child’s right to life. I believe that abortion is murder, and women who find themselves with an unplanned pregnancy need to take responsibility for their own actions.

Don’t tell me I’m taking away a woman’s right to choose — she has plenty of choices. A woman can choose not to engage in sexual intercourse, or she can choose to use any of the numerous birth control methods available in today’s society.

Once she is pregnant, she still has choices – raise the baby herself, or give it up for adoption to a couple that wants to have a baby, but is unable to do so. I don’t believe abortion should be included in the choices, but I (and many others) would never consider murdering someone who disagreed with me. I am dismayed that one person didn’t think that “right to life” means that everyone, even an abortionist, has a right to life.

Instead of murdering, the person who committed this act (Roeder hasn’t yet been found guilty, so I’ll presume he’s innocent) could have done any number of things to support life nonviolently.

He could have contributed money to a nonviolent pro-life organization, volunteered to hand out pamphlets or work with a crisis pregnancy organization, or even picketed Tiller’s clinic. The fact that he decided to murder Tiller is very telling of his state of mind at the time, and I hope this person’s actions don’t reflect poorly on all pro-lifers.