This is probably not a new observation, but I think we are seeing a judges rebellion, judges basically telling non-judges to stay out of their business. They aren't at this point interested in any bottom-up review of the case, they aren't at this point interested in Theresa Schindler as a human being, their priority is defending their turf from anyone outside their guild.
I am sick at my stomach, to be frank. I'm not afraid for her, death isn't the end, and death isn't to be feared. I am more afraid for what this means, for what this case reveals about the moral state of affairs among the living.
The end of life comes for us all, and at the end, as the fight comes to a close, there are difficult decisions to be made as we try and decide how to continue that final fight. It can be difficult at the end to know whether and how to proceed. But I can easily promise that I will never stand by and allow food and water to be cut off. Refuse some further procedure, and the disease takes its course. Refuse food and water, and you have become complicit in killing someone you claim to love.
Its odd, the attack on 9/11 was a kind of watershed, an event that forced people to choose where they stood on some very key issues. People who I had previously admired, or tolerated, who chose wrong I have been unable to ever again see in the same light, I have lost respect for individuals and institutions and whole countries because of it.
This is another such event. People are forced to choose, to defend her, or to be complicit in her death, and those who choose wrong, and those who have refused to choose, are marked in my eyes, I will not be able to look at them in the same light again.
There is something almost biblical in the way the entire world stands by to watch this woman's death as we approach Easter, as men in suits studiously wash their hands of her and turn away.
Well said. Thank you.
If so, the federal judges went out of their way to convey the opposite impression in their opinions this week. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had taken the opportunity to slap Congress and perhaps declare the weekend law unconstitutional. But they didn't. They accepted its constitutionality at face value and even delved into legislative intent.
Very well said! Thank you.
RE: Judges rebellion
You may be right! Sad.
I agree this is a watershed moral event. Most people however choosing to support the husband are unaware of the details of the case. I have found that most of them (not all by any stretch) upon hearing of the details of the husbands behavior and treatment of his wife and unfaithfulness to her, then turn and support keeping Terri alive.
The only way to tear through the obfuscations and reach the truth is to seek simplicity.
Your post does exactly that at least as well as, and probably better than, anything else I have seen written on this dreadful subject. A heartfelt thank you!
Abominations such as partial birth abortion have been condoned in part because they are actually performed ‘in private’ and because the re-directed attention mentioned above chooses to focus elsewhere (to focus instead on the use of steroids by professional baseball players, or who should be the next American Idol ... ).
Terri Schiavo’s case is different. Even those who have been unaware of her plight for the past fifteen years have been dragged into the fray because their President and congress have become involved (although I believe the majority of Americans are still ignorantly unaware of Michael Schiavo’s probable motives and wicked past behaviors). But the media can no longer ignore her premeditated murder. There are now three hundred million witnesses to it. And yet we all sit by, impotent to come to her rescue because, as you so eloquently observed, unelected, unaccountable judicial tyrants are either too lazy or too agenda-driven to look Terri, and her murderer, square in the face. And their questionable ‘decisions’ have trumped those of our own elected representatives.
I believe that, once Terri’s murder has been accomplished, the average American will crawl back into his comfortable cocoon (if indeed he chose to emerge at all), return to concentrating on bread and circuses, and the judicial tyrants and their accomplices on the Hill and in the media and academia will continue to claim increasing malevolent power over all of our lives, and, if terrorists from outside of our borders don’t drive the final nail, homegrown ignorance and apathy may.
That is not to say that those of us who still seek to know His will for this republic should throw in the towel. Not by a long shot. Man has free will, but God is, and always will be, in control. He will allow our evil choices, but His love for the faithful is eternal. His power is infinite, but His patience with evil is not. And the evil represented by this example of ‘American justice’ may be without precedent.
~ joanie
I am sick at my stomach, to be frank. I'm not afraid for her, death isn't the end, and death isn't to be feared. I am more afraid for what this means, for what this case reveals about the moral state of affairs among the living.
I looks very much to me, too, that the "high priests of secularism" are here defending their temple, their dogma, against contamination by the non-priestly caste. And yet the law given by our Constitution is an expression of the will of the people -- not the general will (which is all you can ever get from illegitimate judges in violation of their own oaths of office) -- and is supposed to secure the people's inalienable rights, preeminently that of life, liberty, and property. Law is the means to an end, not an end in itself. The end is justice. But there is absolutely no justice in this barbaric episode. These men evidently have no conscience, and feel no shame whatsoever.
Dear marron, it is good to be reminded of the truths of your next paragraph, that death is not the end; the Lord is our Living God who loves Terri, so all will be well with her even if this murderous plot against her life should succeed. Your second point is also totally on the mark, IMO, and speaks to my own deep concerns: "I am more afraid for what this means, for what this case reveals about the moral state of affairs among the living...."
I've seen polls that indicate that something like 70% of the public doesn't see any problem with what is happening to Terri, and only something like 30% are able to perceive the hideous judicial murder being perpetrated on her by her "husband" in collusion with the Courts. Seventy percent have apparently indicated that if it were their own spouse under the same circumstances as Terri, they would "pull the plug."
Jeff Head spoke earlier about virtue, quoting extensively from our Framers and Founders to the effect that a people lacking in virtue cannot long maintain their liberty. Now we see that an unvirtuous people may not long maintain their life either. Once you start having "experts" setting themselves up as judges of who is fit to live or die based on their own subjective "quality of life" criteria, then no one's safe.
The fact that judges have imposed a death sentence on an innocent human being sickens me to my core. But this second point fills me with profound fear and dread about our American future. Kiddos, read the tea leaves: The camel's nose is 'way under the tent here. (And as the proverb continues, "very soon he will be in bed with you."...) These usurpers have got to be stopped, or plenty more will be dying soon. And it is up to We the People to restrain them; for certainly they cannot or will not restrain themselves.