Sad News: David Brudnoy Very Ill

WBZ - Boston ^

[Conservomax]

WBZ'S David Brudnoy is saying good-bye to his friends. After living with AIDS for years, David’s cancer, merckle cell carcinoma has spread to his liver and kidneys and his prognosis at Mass General Hospital is not good.

All too often in the news business, its not good news we have to report and this is one of those stories. WBZ's Gary LaPierre had an extended conversation today with a very prominent member of our family here at WBZ, Dr. David Brudnoy.

David Brudnoy asked to have this conversation so that he, a nationally prominent radio talk show host, could say farewell to you... his listening public, his family.

Simply put and to the point, David Brudnoy is looking death straight in the eye today and is saying to his family... his listeners, I’m ready. It was very apparent when I stepped into David’s room at the Mass General today that one of the giant survivors of this sometimes very unforgiving business is talking to his family that’s you... for the last time.

10-years ago I talked to David, a mere skeleton of a man, fighting back from death by full-blown AIDS. This tough guy won.

A little more than a year ago, a deathbed struggle ensues again for David Brudnoy, merkel-cell carcinoma. He launched another 15 round battle with a rare deadly disease and won... until now. David told us today, he's losing this one. I asked him how its different this time.

David "it's gone below the waist. It’s in the liver and kidneys."

While at times, struggling a bit for the breath to speak, David Brudnoy is always, the open book and I couldn't help by ask why, while standing at deaths door he wants to share it all.

David “You go through a couple of days of that… more pain… pointless. No end.”

Gary: “What you are saying to continue would be just to continue your being for a few more days?”

David: “With morphine and a little oxygen and food. I am not starving myself. I am not asking my doctors to do anything illegal. I wish I could but they won't. I will make it through. My head is completely excepting of this. I am absolutely ready.”

David Brudnoy, as only David could do it, gets the chance to say his final farewells to the world.

David: “I think we in the media often times want everybody else to be frank about themselves but want to be covert about ourselves. My life is truly an open book.”

Gary: “It always has been.”

David: “It has been but more so as I contend with these diseases.”

So tonight, he'll be heard in a bed-side interview with WBZ's Gary LaPierre in what will be his final farewell.

All of us here at WBZ have David Brudnoy in our thoughts and prayers today.

[chs68]

I'm just curious, af_vet_1981.

Do you think it is possible, through the way one witnesses his or her faith in Jesus, to bring people closer to the Lord?

Do you also think that it is possible, through the way one witnesses his or her faith in Jesus, to drive people away from the Lord?

The reason I ask this is that I have run into several people who tell me that the reason they have no use for Christ or His Gospel is that they have encountered far too many people who profess Christ, but who are mean-spirited, hateful, judgmental, condeming, unforgiving, ungracious, and who are actually glad to think that someone is going to be separated from God for all eternity.

These people I have run into tell me that if that is what a follower of Christ is like -- and, more importantly, if that is what the God Christians worship is like -- then they want no part of Christianity.

My guess is that God will reserve a special kind of punishment for those who profess His name and who, by their ungracious conduct towards others, actually drive people away from Him.

But that's just my guess.

[af_vet_1981]

I am on your side here, but no matter how many people Brudnoy will kill through his sick, perverted and reckless behavior I doubt it is as many as Osama.

Undoubtably so, I was simply pointing out the fallacy of their interpretation. It is incongruent and illogical.

If Bill Clinton contracted AIDS he would be a hero as well. Some people really don't have a concept of shame. Homosexual addiction has become chic. I find nothing heroic about dying of AIDS one contracted by homosexual sexual addiction. It is sad, harsh, and a warning to others.

[Antoninus]

If he has turned to God and asked forgiveness and put his faith in Jesus, then he is O.K.

That is perfectly true. But there is no indication that he has done so. Instead, he remained publicly defiant in defense of his sin. Who knows how many were led astray by such rhetoric?

[af_vet_1981]

You must go to that church in Kansas.

I'm of the opinion that women in particular are more sympathetic for men who suffer from HomosexualAddiction because they are naturally attracted to men and the thought of men being attracted to other men does not repulse them. It may even be attractive to some of them. Men have similar issues regarding homosexual women. Nonetheless it is abomination, unnatural, and a new religious cult for atheists.

[Mogger]

When I lived in Rhode Island I'd listen to both David and Larry Glick. Larry Glick made me laugh and David made me think.

Ditto... only I was driving all over the roads of northern New Hampshire... The two of them kept me awake and alive.

I doubt either will ever come close to being duplicated.

Both great men.

[af_vet_1981]

Well, there are many people who claim to be Christians and celebrate the cult of HomosexualAddiction. They probably agree with you.

[Antoninus]

Brudnoy has, as far as I know, committed no crime.

I heard him admit in an interview on Imus that he continued to have gay 'sex' even though he knew he had AIDS. If that's not a crime, it should be.

[af_vet_1981]

Then have sympathy for David. He became celibate after he was diagnosed. He never advertised his homosexuality as he did not want to be a "poster boy" for homosexual activists. He only came out because the media threatened to out him first.

Go back and read the article I linked in my earlier comments.

[chs68]

"Well, there are many people who claim to be Christians and celebrate the cult of HomosexualAddiction. They probably agree with you."

Just so you know, af_vet_1981:

None -- not a single one -- of the people I mentioned in my earlier posts worships at the altar of HomosexualAddiction. None -- not a single one of them -- celebrates the cult of HomosexualAddiction.

It's truly sad, though.

Because at least two of the people I mentioned in my earlier post are people who a struggling with their own homosexual feelings. People who are attracted to members of their own sex, but who wish that they did not have those feelings.

Do you know why they don't come to Christ?

Because they see too many people who claim to be followers of Christ who are quick to condemn, quick to judge, quick to wish them a one-way ticket to Hell, quick to be aomngst the most ungracious, uncaring people they encounter.

They are, in other words, driven from the One who could provide them the peace in their souls they so desperately want and seek. And the ones who are driving these people from Jesus?

People who seem to forget that Jesus is gracious, wanting none to perish.

[af_vet_1981]

In reply to your question, I think HomosexualAddicts face the same type of hurdles HeroinAddicts and CrackCocaineAddicts do. I think the former have a bigger problem with enablers than the latter.

[chs68]

"In reply to your question, I think HomosexualAddicts face the same type of hurdles HeroinAddicts and CrackCocaineAddicts do. I think the former have a bigger problem with enablers than the latter."

In reply to my question?

Which question are you replying to? I have asked you three questions:

Do you think it is possible, through the way one witnesses his or her faith in Jesus, to bring people closer to the Lord?

Do you also think that it is possible, through the way one witnesses his or her faith in Jesus, to drive people away from the Lord?

Do you know why they don't come to Christ?

Let me make sure I understand your answer.

Are you suggesting that being gracious (that is, modeling the hate of the sin but the love for the sinner that Jesus most likely would show) to a person who is ensanred by an addiciton they wish to escape is enabling them or their behavior?

[af_vet_1981]

The other factor to consider is, like HeroinAddicts, they are looking for a congregation that accepts them as they are, in fact a congregation that enables them to satisfy their lusts works even better.

They could make a British play out of it.

No Guilt Please, We're Addicts

[chs68]

"The other factor to consider is, like HeroinAddicts, they are looking for a congregation that accepts them as they are, in fact a congregation that enables them to satisfy their lusts works even better."

They?

Who is this "they" you are speaking of??

[af_vet_1981]

Enablers are gracious, but they are death for addicts. Addicts don't really want to change. They want someone to listen and help them pretend they are "okay" when they are not okay.

[chs68]

Let me see if I understand you correctly.

"Addicts don't really want to change." Are you saying that no one caught in addiction ever wants out?

Have you ever heard of AA?

"They want someone to listen and help them pretend they are "okay" when they are not okay."

No doubt some do, but are you saying that ALL addicts only want someone to listen and help them pretend they are "okay" when they are not okay? Every sinlge person caught in every single addiction is like this?

"Enablers are gracious, but they are death for addicts."

There is no doubt in my mind that enablers are death for addicts.

That is why I would never consider an enabler to be in any way "gracious"

I'm frankly rather astounded that you cuold ever consider behavior which enables destructive behavior in another human being to be in any way "gracious". Jesus was most certainly gracious, but as far as I know He never enabled any destructive sort of behavior on another human being.

It strikes me that you have a mistaken view either of grace and graciousness or of enabling.

[af_vet_1981]

Addicts in general don't really want to change. There are always some to break the chains they have bound themselves with. This applies to HomosexualAddicts as well. I would not be surprised to see the "liberation rates" to be sort of similar among HomosexualAddicts, CrackCocaineAddicts, HeroinAddicts, and Alchoholics. I expect it hovers in the 10 - 20% range but I may be optimistic.

[af_vet_1981]

No doubt some do, but are you saying that ALL addicts only want someone to listen and help them pretend they are "okay" when they are not okay? Every sinlge person caught in every single addiction is like this?

I think so. They only break that illusion when the pain of reality shocks them into some other light. I think most succumb to the addiction until death though.

[chs68]

"I would not be surprised to see the "liberation rates" to be sort of similar among HomosexualAddicts, CrackCocaineAddicts, HeroinAddicts, and Alchoholics. I expect it hovers in the 10 - 20% range but I may be optimistic."

So, what you are really saying is that you have absolutely no idea -- except your own uninformed, babbity views about Homosexual addicts, crack cocaine addicts, heroin addicts, and alcoholics -- as to how many addicts truly desire a release from their addicitions, and how many are able to become free from their addicitions.

And yet you state -- and state with such certainty -- that "Addicts in general don't really want to change.".

More to the point, when I suggested earlier that I knew people -- people who confesses that they had feelings for members of their own sex -- and that they had been driven from the Love and Good News Of Jesus and His Gospel Message by people who were ungracious, condemming, judgmental, and lacking in basic compassion, your only response to me was that "addicts really don't want to change".

I believe in the transforming power of Jesus' gracious Love.

You appear quite willing to leave addicts where you think they belong -- away from God and condemned to hell.

You will be in my prayers. For I do hope that God has mercy on your soul, so filled as it is with bitterness and anger.

[af_vet_1981]

You're so cute when you enable.

[chs68]

"You're so cute when you enable."

It saddens me to come to an awareness of myself that includes the fact that I am enabling destructive behavior in another human being.

And that is what I am doing -- for each of your posts simply becomes a means for you to demonstrate the corrosiveness that exists in a soul unable to love, show compassion, or demonstrate grace.

I have no doubt that you would think me "cute" as I enable behavior in you that destroys your very soul.

You will be in my prayers.