Christopher Reeve, Man of SteelFWIW

vanity | October 11, 2004 | self

[Dr. Eckleburg]

I preface this short vanity by saying I am pro-life, anti-abortion, anti-stem cell playing-God...

I have a friend who worked on Christopher Reeve's latest TV movie which Reeve just finished directing.

Movie sets are generally bedlam, filled with chaos, complaints, back-stabbing and petty irritations.

My friend said this production was different -- a life-changing experience for everyone involved with it.

The direction on the set was altered to accommodate Reeve's limitations which, according to my friend, were unimaginable. Reeve had to show up before dawn hours ahead of schedule in order to prepare for the rigors of production. He was constantly hooked up to machines. He could move nothing but his facial muscles. He was never alone, yet he was all alone.

Throughout the weeks, Reeve was steady, focused and serene. No one argued about craft services or late entrances or slow lighting. Everyone pitched in and did more than their share -- willingly, gratefully, aware of the tremendous effort Reeve was making and of his constant, unfathomable suffering.

My friend is not a particularly religious man, but he said he felt blessed and humbled to witness Christopher Reeve's profound courage and grace.

His pain is ended; he's strong and whole now. May God comfort those who loved him.

[SupplySider]

Sorry to say, I think this thread deserves to be pulled now, too.

I really don't get using the occasion of someone's passing to denigrate him for his daring to differ from one's own scriptural interpretations.

[asgardshill]

Sorry to say, I think this thread deserves to be pulled now, too.

You'll get no argument from me on that one. The venom spewing from the single-issuers really does make FR look bad.

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

No, I don't believe Reeve was an evil man, but misguided. Not all pro-aborts know that they are doing wrong whenever they support the killing of babies in their wombs. Many of them are not the doctors and lawyers privy to the "real thing" (and God how I hate abortion doctors...they know above all else exactly what they do for a living) and have simply been brainwashed by the left into actually BELIEVING that they are committing no wrong. Because they believe that no baby exists "at that stage", they do not think that they are killing babies at all ( I have relatives who fall into this category despite my protests to the contrary). Hardly an evil belief in those cases, but a baseless, foolish, and unrealistic view to be sure.

You can't execute a (figuratively) retarded person for a murder they did not know they committed.

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

Another (supposedly) Christian freeper who claims to have God's on his speed dial. When will y'all hook me up with His private number because I've been praying to Him (and sometimes seeing his answers in my life's work) for years now and I've never even gotten ONE direct and immediate answer. The way you talk, you can not only see the future and talk to the Burning Bush yourself, but you're also the Shadow. Who "Know what evil lurks in the hearts of men?"

So you know that I'm going to hell because I don't agree with your desecration of the recently deceased Christopher Reeves?
Damn, it's getting easier and easier to fry these days if God is taking the advice of lunkheaded losers like you over the compassionate wisdom of His only Son.

[ClintonBeGone]

When will y'all hook me up with His private number because I've been praying to Him (and sometimes seeing his answers in my life's work) for years now and I've never even gotten ONE direct and immediate answer.

Oh, you'll get your answer when you least expect it.

-Their foot shall slide in due time- Deut. 32:35

[SanityFromTheLeftCoast]

Absolutely, prayers for the family and friends of Christopher Reeve and to those who he inspired.

[ClintonBeGone]

Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven (Matt. 7:21).

That's all I need my friend.

[P-Marlowe]

RESEARCH CLONING
A Disability Perspective

A Statement by Joni Eareckson Tada and the Christian Council on
Persons with Disabilities

My heart goes out to newly injured people who have suffered spinal cord damage. No one understands better their desire for a cure, than I. Thirty five years ago when I broke my neck and became a quadriplegic, I was desperate for anything - "please, doctors, researchers, do anything" - that would repair my spinal cord and give me back use of my legs and hands. Acute disability does that: it screams for reprieve, demanding that a cure be gained at any cost.

Thirty five years later, my perspective has changed. Time makes one look at the broader implications - not how embryonic stem cell research would impact the individual, but society as a whole. Yes, my husband and I still encourage spinal cord injury research and cure, but not to the degree that the benefits of a possible cure outweigh the serious and permanent consequences.

For me, and tens of thousands of people with disabilities, the security of human dignity and respect for human life is paramount to securing a cure. The rights of people with disabilities - especially those disadvantaged and weak - are safeguarded in a society that honors life and treats humanity with respect. However, the weak and infirmed are exposed in a society that thinks nothing of creating a class of human lives for the explicit purpose of exploitation. This is the Pandora's box research cloning would open. Ironically, the disabled would be the first to be threatened in a world where eugenics and the bio-tech industry set the moral agenda. It's an impersonal world that uses the guise of "cure" while devaluing the very human life it purports to help.

Historically, people with disabilities have never fared well in utilitarian societies where right versus wrong doesn't count, but whether or not "it will work." One prominent pro-cloning advocate, in his testimony before the Senate, said, "The duty of government is to do the greatest good for the greatest number" - yet it was this ideology which paved the way for the extermination of hundreds of thousands of people with disabilities in World War II. Rather, the duty of government is to safeguard the rights of the weak and marginalized; in so doing, the rights of all are upheld. This strikes at the heart of the cloning debate. If experimental cloning were legalized by the passage of the Feinstein or Harkin bills, for the first time in history it would become a crime not to kill an entire class of human beings. I can?t think of anything that would more damage the character of our helping society.

As a person with a disability, that's not the kind of world I want. Research should not benefit me at the expense of other human life. I do not want a society that establishes in law a class of embryos that it is a crime not to destroy. It makes no sense for valuable resources dedicated to safe and more promising adult stem cell research to be diverted for cloning experimentation - there is scientific data showing that stem cells can be obtained from the blood of the umbilical cord, from neuro-tissue, bone marrow and skin cells.

I join countless Americans with disabilities in deploring the "harvesting" of human life; I find it shameful that some of my associates with disabilities are using their physical impairment as a plea to promote research cloning, and I am offended that words like "helpless victim" and "being trapped in a useless body" are used to sway the sympathies of legislators. Rather, let us influence our society with reasoned judgment, strength of character, and a commitment to improve our culture, not diminish it.

[asgardshill]

I prefer this verse from Matthew.

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily, I say unto you, They have their reward." Matthew 6:5

This one from Luke is appropo as well.

"Either how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother let me pull the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull the mote that is in thy brother's eye." Luke 6:42

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

Oh, now Reeves is not only evil, but comparable to Uday and Qusay Hussein ??!!

This thread has got to be one of the all-time low points in the otherwise storied history of FR.
Remember the posts on here a few months ago that rightly called out the vicious, ugly attacks on the President the DUers were attempting the very day that Pres. Reagan died? DU Marxists saying crap like they'll be "breaking out the finest champagne"? Remember all the righteous indignation showed by the Freepers? Remember all of the calls for civility... I'd never do that...not even to my worst enemy...Republicans are better than that...Freepers are better than that...etc?

I used to think that were true, I really did. That was before I saw this post and saw a dozen or more Freepers devolve into snarling beasts more reminicent of the DUmmies than any of you would like to admit.
How is it any better when many of you basically call for Reeve to burn in hell than when the dems were doing that to Reagan on DU?

Some things are just reprehensible, regardless of ideology.

[SupplySider]

Oh, you'll get your answer when you least expect it.

I think taking glee in the presumed damnation of one's brother is the least attractive quality of the the superficialists (aka phony fundamentalists).

Believing in the Holy Bible is most laudable, but it hardly grants license for bad behavior.

[BibChr]

Joni absolutely rocks.

I've often said, if I even get to take out the trash in her neighborhood of Heaven, I'll be a blessed man.

Dan

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

Depends. Murderous thugs like Eric Rudolph believed they were doing "the will of the Father" too.

Your will and God's are not mutually exclusive, but they aren't exactly joined-at-the-hip either.

[IAMNO1]

Hear hear!

[ClintonBeGone]

Remember the posts on here a few months ago that rightly called out the vicious, ugly attacks on the President the DUers were attempting the very day that Pres. Reagan died?

The only thing the two have in common is the first letter of the last name. Ronald Reagan was a prince of life. I can't say the same for the other.

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

Oh, and that's God, not G*d. A good Christian like you claim to be should know the difference between fair usage and blasphemy. We are talking about God Almighty here, so you're not breaking the 3rd Commandment to spell it out.

[Ciexyz]

I've always loved the movie, "Somewhere in Time". Such a marvelous fantasy. Jane Seymour never looked more beautiful, and her romantic scenes with Christopher were wonderful.

RIP, Christopher.

[ClintonBeGone]

I think taking glee in the presumed damnation of one's brother

I take NO glee in the fact that he'll burn in hell if he doesn't change his ways. Some day I hope he will be saved.

[ClintonBeGone]

We are talking about God Almighty here, so you're not breaking the 3rd Commandment to spell it out.

Read slower. I was quoting asgardshill.

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

Didn't mean to compare the two (Reagan was the far superior individual, and an anti-Communist hero of mine). Simply pointing out that people like you have de facto adopted an enormously hypocritical stance by lambasting the vile comments sprayed on Pres. Reagan at DU solely because the DUers disagreed with Reagan's politics, while yourself spewing almost equally vile (...go to hell, evil man, etc.) comments against Reeve on the date of his death simply because you disagree with his politics.

To me, you are no different than the slime who wrote the now-infamous "turning a crispy brown" quote about Pres. Reagan. Because the deceased is now a Democrat is NO excuse at all.