Giving "Water to the Least of These" -- Changing the Terri Schiavo Strategy

It is evident that attending nurses have affidavits affirming that Terri Schiavo was able only a few short years ago to ingest food and water orally.

This is also evidenced by the "guardian's" insistence on police overlooking her room to prevent her parents from doing just that....a secret drink, an ice chip, etc.

There is no moral order able to be given that she not have the CHANCE to eat and drink in a manner normal for babies and others who might find themselves in a dependent status.

OK....if that is accepted, then it is only fair, judicious, humane, and NATURAL to have a good faith attempt by totally uninvolved, neutral caregivers to give her food and water orally.

Change strategy -- demand the natural feeding of Terri Schiavo if there is no hope of a feeding tube being inserted! Demand Federal intervention to require this reasonable and NATURAL act!

Let's put the lie to supposedly humane cries for a "Natural" death for Terri Schiavo.

Finally, to give her water would be the side that is affirmed by Jesus Christ Himself: "Mr 9:41 - And whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because of My name, since you belong to the Messiah-- I assure you: He will never lose his reward. "

15 years of single syllable cooing sounds

That is not the issue. The issue is to proceed within the bounds of Christian morality and to judge based on Christian morality.

We always work from there in our evaluations of the law of man and not vice versa.

The only church speaking up that I have heard to date is the Catholic Church. Salvation posted their position early on this thread.

Essentially, it is immoral to deprive her of oral (natural) means of feeding and hydration. The principle appears to be that one cannot actively cause a death; one can passively allow a death.

To remove opportunity to ingest food and water is immoral.

The slippery slope of government enforced "right to die" becomes "the unfit are only fit to die." It's only a matter of time.

You, of all people, should realize that only the free exercise of my informed will makes me human. If I lose that to age or injury or infirmity, I should have the right to keep 'modern medicine' from keeping my vacant body 'alive' in a vegetative (non-volitional) state. If you concur that I do, then we must agree that I can have some recourse to enforce of that right if the stronger or the more evil or -- as around here -- the louder, the more intolerant and the more absolutist should wish to deny me that right. This is true, a fortiori because this right comes only to fruition when I am, by definition, most weak and defenseless.

Now, I can hope that my family members, to whom I entrust this sacred duty to assist me in ending my abuse and defenselessness, will keep their heads down and below the radar of the 'physical life at any cost' absolutists so popular here. But is my homegoing to be at the mercy of one disaffected relative wanting a crack at my estate? Can they intimidate the government from enforcing my directives and thereby sentence me, as they did poor Terri, to years of forced feeding and diapers? And the government upon which I relied to enforce the sanctity of my contracts is then to stand idly by while they pump me daily with nutritional slurry and change my diapers? And, I am supposed to do exactly what to escape the clutches of the absolutists -- will myself to stop breathing?

No, my long and vigorous life in support of this government earns me their cooperation in protecting my escape to Heaven, bypassing the slurry and the diapers. I have earned and deserve enforcement of my advance directive. After all, we know that we are not like "... the rest who have no hope." Our 'life' is not to be found in some vacant, slobbering, incontinent, twisted body 'cooing one syllable sounds' which only the desperate and the denying would call 'life', but in the vibrant, glowing Life to come with our Lord. Our true home awaits.

It will say, "When did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or naked....inasmuch as you did unto one of the least of these my brethren, you did it unto me." We have already been told in the bible what the voice will say.

Well, the Bible doesn't say, "When you see some poor soul in a persistent vegetative state, you should ignore their will, and pump their bowels full of nutritional slurry and into their diapers for years, all the while claiming you are doing it for high-minded reasons in My Name." No, my friend, He clearly won't say that.

He will in fact say, as He said to the Egyptians when they held His people in captivity and imprisonment for their own purposes: "Let My people go!" And eventually, as did the hardhearted Pharaoh, you will.

WC: ... another 15 years of single syllable cooing sounds, force feeding and diapers.

XZ: That is not the issue. The issue is to proceed within the bounds of Christian morality and to judge based on Christian morality.... The only church speaking up that I have heard to date is the Catholic Church.

That might give you a clue that you are on the wrong road. Only an accretionist church like the RCC can find its summum bonum in the vacant-eyed, slobbering, incontinent, twisted, limb-withdrawn 'life' of the brain dead.

What is lost in the vicious version of 'Christian morality' offered by the majority here is the absolute immorality of imprisoning the brain dead like poor Terri with slurry pumps and diapers so that her jailers can pose Pharisaically as paragons of the new 'morality' which elevates the 'emotional cooing of single syllable sounds' as the new norm. Only if you can forget half the equation: what you are doing to the 'subject' of all your 'morality' ministrations.

Could you say for one minute with any honesty that you would prefer Terri's 15 years of hellish slurry and diapers to going Home to Jesus? Of course, you can't. This vicious version of 'Christian morality' turns the Golden Rule on its head: 'Do unto others as you would never have done unto you.' You would need a pope to sell that as 'Christian morality.'

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BTW, in defense of good RCC people, most RCC adherents don't believe that nonsense either. Someone quoted a poll on another thread here the other day that 65% of RCC adherents support assisted suicide. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Could you say for one minute with any honesty that you would prefer Terri's 15 years of hellish slurry and diapers to going Home to Jesus? Of course, you can't.

I do think their moral stance on this issue is correct. Actively pursuing death is wrong in this instance.

So far as being in such a state is correct, I understand you to say that the brain is mush, and that there is no cognizance at all. Therefore, in the same circumstance, I would have no reaction whatsoever, and it wouldn't bother me one way or the other.

Your better case is made if you give some awareness to a trapped, aware soul within that tent. But then you've affirmed the presence of the spark that makes caution the better choice.

Your better case is made if you give some awareness to a trapped, aware soul within that tent. But then you've affirmed the presence of the spark that makes caution the better choice.

That is true. The argument is that she is "brain dead". If that is true, then there is no harm in keeping her alive as long as it makes her parents happy. After all if she is dead and her body is nothing more than a "corpse with a pulse" as one poster put it, then she has already gone on to her reward. So what is the hurry to stop the pulse?

However, if she is "trapped" in a useless body (as another poster implies) and would be better off dead, then to starve her to death is to torture her. She should just be shot or smothered or injected with window cleaner. At least it would minimize her suffering.

Medical science has advanced to the point where we can keep a person artificially alive through machinery. We have machines that can breathe for us, process our waste, feed us nourishment and medications, etc. etc. They can take over when our organs fail. It’s fine to use all this technology temporarily until the body itself can take over the functions performed by these machines. However, we now have the technology that would keep us alive from a purely mechanical standpoint indefinitely, even though the body itself will never recover.

In my view, to prolong this artificial life is sacrilegious. What man is doing in these circumstances is trying to overrule God. God has His own timetable for how long He wants us to stay on this earth and that timetable also includes a time when He expects us to come to Him when he calls. With all this machinery, unless there is some hope of recovery, we are trying to circumvent or disrupt that timetable.

Also, we have a natural desire to keep our loved ones alive for as long as possible. But it soon gets to the point that in doing so, we are not doing what is best for the patient; our desire to keep that person alive becomes purely selfish. Selfishness is also contrary to Christian beliefs.

My mother had a living will wherein she expressed her wish that no extraordinary measures be expended to keep her alive when there is no hope for recovery. When she was admitted to the hospital for the last time with breathing difficulty, she was placed on a respirator. In a few days, surgeons recommended insertion of a tube in her trachea with the objective of eventually weaning her from the breathing machine. At the time, my brother and I (who were appointed as her trustees to carry out her living will) agreed to the procedure inasmuch as there seemed to be some hope of recovery. However, in the meantime, Mother had developed jaundice, edema and other symptoms, and various diagnostic tests were performed. The day she was supposed to have the trachea tube inserted, test results came back which indicated that her liver had failed and her other organs were also in decline. After consultation with her physicians, it was established that there was no hope for recovery. My brother and I made the decision to execute the living will and remove Mother from her breathing machine. God called her home the next day.

The decision to disconnect my mother from the machine was not done with any cold calculation. Where I live, the law requires the agreement of two physicians to the implementation of a living will. We were fortunate in that all of her doctors (she had so many, I lost count) were in agreement that there was no hope for recovery. But it was still difficult to make that decision. There are times even now when I think about that decision and occasionally, I try to second guess myself. But every time, I conclude that my brother and I did the right thing.

This of course is apparently far different from Mrs. Schiavo’s situation. Apparently, she is able to breathe on her own and her organs do function. She only depended on a feeding tube. Unlike my mother’s situation, there is some disagreement among doctors as to whether there is any hope for recovery. There is some disagreement as to how much cognizance she has. And, apart from her husband’s word, we have no written directives from Mrs. Schiavo as whether or not she wants to be kept in this state. Morally, in view of all of these things, I would say it would be better to keep Mrs. Schiavo alive. However, as I said before, the law now has little to do with what would be morally correct. The 20 plus judges who have reviewed this case were not about to be swayed by morality; they were going to follow the law. It doesn't appear that any other judge will do differently.

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