A Book of American Martyrs(5)
Defending the unborn. Justifiable homicide.
It had tugged at my conscience, that a comrade in the Army of God, James Kopp, known to me only by name, had assassinated the abortion doctor Barnett Slepian in Buffalo, New York, nearly one year ago, on Veterans Day (November 11) 1998, and was now sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Many of us are praying for him, that he will not sink into despair. Some years earlier, the martyr Michael Griffin had stepped forward to assassinate the notorious abortion doctor David Gunn at a women’s clinic in Pensacola, Florida, and had traded his life for his. And there was Terence Mitchell in Traverse City, Michigan—whom we prayed for last year—found guilty of homicide and sentenced to life in prison.
In Livingston, Kentucky, there was Shaun Harris who’d shot down the abortionist Paul Erich, and had not yet come to trial . . .
Now the Lord had turned His eye upon Luther Dunphy and I could not hide. On the roof of the house overlooking the ravine, the rich man’s house, in the eye of the sun pounding on my head through the cloth cap, into my brain. As if it were a problem in geometry in my son Luke’s textbook I was made to realize that there is a next person to act and that this person would be—me.
“Only say the word. My soul shall be healed.”
There had been other sharp turns in my life. These turns that had altered the course of my life, usually without my realizing at the time, but only later. But never a turn so clear as the Lord’s mission for me.
For the remainder of that day I worked harder than anyone else in our crew. Harder than the younger men who spend too much time talking and laughing together, uttering profanities, telling dirty jokes. As if your own lips are not polluted, in the telling of dirty jokes. And such laughter, over-loud, like hyenas braying, wears away the soul.
You, Luther Dunphy. You are the chosen one.
You, to bring down the abortion murderer Voorhees that your Christian brethren may rejoice.
There is an agitation in hammering nails but it is a controlled agitation. All carpentry is a controlled action, to a purpose. One nail, and another nail. A sequence of nails, in the construction of a house. How many nails, how many blows of the hammer!—the Lord God looks upon Luther Dunphy in wonder, in whom He is well pleased.
“Luther? Hey—”
Voices from below lifting in my direction which I heard (of course I heard) but at a distance, through the distraction of the more urgent voice whispering in my ears.
The foreman Ed Fischer was calling to me. And another, calling my name. But in the shock of realizing that Luther Dunphy had been singled out by the Lord, and that Luther Dunphy was me, I could not seem to reply but stared down at them dumbly.
SURE LUTHER DUNPHY was an excellent roofer. Luther was a super employee in every way. Responsible, reliable, never hurried, never did a careless or half-assed job, never drank on the job, never got into a fight with anybody, worked with us for eleven years and only took time off, maybe six weeks, recovering from an accident that almost killed him. And even then, he came back as soon as he could, and you could see the pain in his face sometimes but he never complained.
It was rare for Luther to lose his temper unlike most of these guys we work with. Nor did he use profanities or obscenities unlike these guys who it’s fuck this, fuck that, every fucking thing, that’s all they can say . . . It wasn’t such a surprise to learn in the news, he’d studied to be a minister in some Bible school in Toledo, before he moved here.
Except, it was obvious Luther took care what he said. He wouldn’t talk behind anybody’s back, for sure. He never got angry—that you could see.
With this recession we’re not building as much as we used to. Some guys I had to lay off, but I tried to use Luther Dunphy as much as I could. He had the experience, and the skill, and this family with young kids, so sure, there was worry there, he’d have a worried look in his face if I told him his workhours were cut back. But he never got angry.
Sometimes, Luther would “go off”—he would look at you, if you spoke to him, but he wouldn’t see you—in his eyes there was a kind of blank, like in eyes that are open when a person is asleep . . .
This terrible accident he had last year out on the highway—one of his young children was killed, and Luther was driving. Nobody ever talked to him about that—how the hell would you know what to say . . .
We knew that Luther was a member of that evangelical church—what’s it called—St. Paul Missionary Church of Jesus. We knew that he was active in the anti-abortion picketing at the Women’s Center, that they call a “vigil.” But nobody would’ve guessed it would go so far—that Luther Dunphy of all people would shoot down two individuals in cold blood, even if they were baby-murderers themselves, Jesus nobody could have foreseen that.
THE MIRACLE OF THE LITTLE HAND
The first time I knew of the Little Hand was stunning to me.
It was a time when Edna Mae had newly come into my life. And the St. Paul Missionary Church of Jesus had come into my life. It was a time of great happiness but a time when often I would feel a choking sensation in my throat, that made it very difficult to breathe, and I could not speak, and tears brimmed in my eyes, of the kind of tears that come into your eyes in dry heat, and not in sorrow; for I was not sorrowful or backward-looking, but joyous, that I would soon be married, and my dear Edna Mae and I would begin our family.