Catholic Ping
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Posted on 03/18/2005 10:01:43 PM PST by PRSOrlando
Terri Schiavo - March 18, 2005
On March 18th, the feeding tube that provided Terri Schiavo with the normal care of food and water was withdrawn. Terri has now begun to die by starvation. One can pray that her husband will have a change of heart or that the State of Florida will find new grounds to intervene so that in spite of what transpired on March 18 th a safer course might still be taken and that Terri “continue to receive nourishment, comfort and loving care” – as we Catholic Bishops of Florida have continually advocated.
As Pope John Paul II points out in his just released book, Memory and Identity, the crisis of our age is rooted in the presumption that we can decide for ourselves what is good and evil without reference to God. Yet, the Decalogue, while certainly an expression of divine positive law, is nonetheless more than a religious code: it is a reflection of natural law – of the law written on the heart of man. In other words, we cannot not know that it is wrong to kill innocent human life.
That we do nevertheless kill is evidence of the misterium iniquitatis at work in the world; but, when we do kill we usually seek by evasions and subterfuges to make up excuses for our crimes. Thus, we disguise what we do by rationalizations: we don’t abort “babies”, we remove the “products of conception”; we don’t murder unarmed civilians, we engage in “ethnic cleansing”; and when we dispatch with a fatal cocktail the feeble minded it is because such a life is lebensunwerter Leben (life “unworthy of life”) –as euthanasia was justified in the Germany of the Third Reich.
In Terri’s case, we can speak of the controversial diagnosis of PVS – persistent vegetative state. Yet, even while to speak of her as a “vegetable” might give a false reassurance to our conflicted consciences, she still remains a human being, no less human than Christopher Reeve who was kept alive on a respirator until he died late last year of natural causes. No one begrudged his heroic struggle to live and we were all edified by his courage and that of his family who stood by him. Terri, however, is not being kept alive by any machine as was Reeve for most of his last decade of life. She only needs assistance to be fed. Does the fact that he could speak and she cannot make it right to deprive her of the ordinary means of human sustenance? If so, how can any of our seriously ill brethren ever again trust themselves to sleep while under a doctor’s care?
Some would argue that to remove her feeding tube is simply to let nature take its course. Yet what is “natural” about starving to death? True, she was fed through a feeding tube – she depends on others but so did Christopher Reeve and so does a newborn baby depend on others for nutrition and hydration. John Donne said: “No man is an island entire of itself”. As members of the human race we all are interdependent on each other to one degree or another. The mark of a civilized society was that the helpless had the greatest claim on our protection. Now it would seem that they have the least.
And so, Holy Week, the annual remembrance of Jesus’ passion and death, begins with the Passion of Terri Schiavo. Terri’s agony has already begun and barring some miracle the denouement of Terri’s drama will be her death. This week in recalling Jesus’ Passover from death to life we celebrate the fact that the misterium iniquitatis is overcome through the misterium crucis. From the cross Jesus cried out and his cry is echoed today by all those held captive to a world of pain and sin. As Terri shares in his passion, she will share in his Resurrection. Like Jesus did, Terri Schiavo cries out, though with muted voice: “I thirst!”
There's NO COMPARISON. They aren't even in the same ball park.
It was GOOD of Bishop Wenski to write it.
They're not people. They're carrots.
Oh yeah, and babies.
They're not babies. They're products of conception. /Satan's Handbook
New borns can not communicate. Let's kill them too???
And that right there is the crux of the problem. There are far too many people justifying the starvation of one handicapped womnan and far too few considering where we go from here and who is next on the list of permissable candidates for euthanasia.
Yep. Good call.
I don't know about this guy, but far too many of our shepherds are focused almost exclusively on "Social Justice", which tranlsates into pacifism, socialism, and open borders.
So does a star athlete or a renowned scientist have more right to live then you? Since when do we grade right to live on a sliding scale?
For that matter, why didn't the Baptist church to which Judge Greer belonged until recently expel him from their ranks? Recently the pastor of that church said he disagreed with the judge's decision. Well, DUHHHH, pastor, Judge Greer has been consistently pro-death for several years now.
Neither the Catholic Church nor the evangelicals have shown the boldness of the apostles in confronting evildoers in their own ranks. Church discipline is a joke in both hierarchical and congregational church organizations.
The world will not take the church seriously until it takes its duty to be an effective witness for good seriously and it removes the motes in its eye before commenting on the specks in the eyes of others.
It seems peculiar that the courts save rodents,flies, frogs, fish and as I recall, even cock roaches, yet these same judges who play God, can't find the wisdom to save a human life, specifically a Catholic life.
Amazingly, the Supreme Court of the United States holds court under the Ten Commandments, yet refused to hear the case of Terri Schiavo, which seems to be blatant hypocrisy with regard to murder. In the event that the courts permit Terri to die, they condone murder and will be participants in a judicial massacre of a helpless lady.
The world might little note what the courts allow to happen tomorrow, so close to Palm Sunday, but by the following Friday every judge that either permits death by starvation for Terri SchiavoSchizoShivaShivSchickSchaferChiveShaveSchmoSchwaAchieveSheaveSivaSachaSavoySavorSalvoArchiveSchSophiaShaverShiverShoveSuaveSilvioSocial by rulings handed down by them, or equally pernicious behavior by washing their hands of the entire affair will surely be remembered by history of carrying out a dastardly deed reminiscent of that washing of the hands about 2,000 years ago byPontius Pilate.
Hundreds of thousands of people around hates world are praying for Terri's life to be spared, while the courts would rather give us Barabbas in the form of animals and rodents in the wetlands.
The good news is that if everything Christians believe in regarding God (and I do), Terri Schiavo might soon be in heaven, while on the other hand, those who choose to participate in her killing might never get an opportunity to meet her, when she will no longer require assistance from anyone in this world.
Nevertheless, if He watches the sparrows that fall from the air, it is surely true that he is also observing all the Solomons of the U.S. judicial system, while they play out their final pre-HolyprettilypurelypriorlyPresleyperiheliaboreholepreheatpremolarprevailprivilyperilprimlyprissilyprowlprimelypronelypinholeprequelpricklyproudlyparoleproperlyporingly Week role as Pontius Pilate.
For those of us who care, the best we can do is pray and for those of us who are Catholic, I might suggest either a rosary or a portion thereof for intervention that the Judge of all judges instills some fear of God in the minds of the judges before it is too, late.
The Catholic Bishops, every Christian leader, indeed EVERY man and woman who cares about humanity should be screaming blue bloody murder over what is happening to Terri.
I cannot begin to tell you how distressed I am.
Catholic Ping
Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list
"Blue Bloody Murder!" (and I am a Protestant)
This is Editorial Statement on Terri Schindler-Schiavo by The Editors of The New Pantagruel in Issue 2.1 of The New Pantagruel. Discuss this article in our forum. View all Pages. Display printer-friendly version. Send a copy to a friend. [id=198]
Once I was sick and unable to communicate, but my wise doctor said that I was better off under the care of my mother than I would be if I were in a hospital. It was the loving care of my mother that saved my life, nothing else.
I think that Terri should not have ever been removed from the love and care of her family, for it is worth more than medicine. A real diservice was done to Terri by allowing Michael Schiavo to continue on as guardian, after he had abandoned his wife for another woman, and had 2 children by her. This was a farce and disgrace!
No it's not. A newborn baby cannot speak.He is totally disoriented and completely dependent on others.
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