Posted on 04/01/2005 7:47:01 AM PST by marshmallow
FATHER FRANK PAVONE, PRIESTS FOR LIFE, NATIONAL DIRECTOR: Last night, I spent about two hours with her until past midnight, together with Bobby Schindler and Suzanne, and then again this morning for about an hour and a half, and then right up until about ten minutes before she died. We were praying, most of that time was spent simply in prayer, in quiet, just caressing her, and assuring her, also, of the prayers and concern of so many people around the world.
Q: Was their any sign of response from Terri Schiavo?
PAVONE: Yes. And let me tell you, I’ll preface that by saying I visited with her several times before the feeding tube was removed. She was very responsive--closing her eyes when I said, “Let’s pray together, Terri,” opening them up after the prayer. Smiling, returning the kiss of her father. Turning her eyes to me when I spoke to her. In many other ways, as well, responsive.
Even today, although, of course, with the effects of the dehydration, her response was much less. Nevertheless, her eyes were open, her eyes were moving, and as I prayed with her, her eyes were shifting over toward my direction--even until the last moments that I was with her.
Q: Now, of course, we are going over old territory, but it’s important to note here, you’ve heard the doctors who suggest that that is all reflexive, that none of it was a conscious movement on her part--either eye movement or anything else. What do you say to that?
PAVONE: Certainly amazingly-time “reflexes.” I’ll give the doctors the benefit of their own expertise. But this raises, of course, the deeper moral issue. Give them what they are saying. What does that mean? That someone at a lower level of functioning can just be starved to death?
That, of course, is the bigger question here. This is not just a death. This is a killing.
And we have to ask ourselves, has our nation now begun to go down the road of killing those who are disabled, simply because somebody says that they want to be killed?
Terri didn’t die today from anything except the fact that her food and water were withheld for the last two weeks. She had no other underlying illness whatsoever. This is a case of throwing away a disabled person.
Q: Father, do we know what happened to the Schindlers, Terri’s parents, during these final moments?
PAVONE: Yes. We were in communication with them this morning by phone, and they were then on their way over here, actually, when we heard the news of Terri’s passing, and then all of us were together inside the hospice just moments after that announcement. They went in to Terri, of course, to embrace her body. I stood at the door and offered the prayers of the church, for those who are just deceased, and of course we sat and just consoled on another, and now they are grieving privately at home. They are going to have a statement a little later.
Q: Were you able to give Terri her last rites?
PAVONE: I was able to give Terri absolution last night. She had already been given the fuller last rites of the Church by other priests in recent days.
Q: It sounds as though, thankfully, there was not a direct conflict between the Schindlers and the Schiavos during these last moments.
PAVONE: Yes. Thanks be to God. Had she lived another hour or so, I’m afraid there might have been, because Bobby was saying, “I will be glad to be in her room, even with Michael there. I want to be there.” And Michael was saying, “No. I don’t want that.” But then she died before that conflict when any further.
Q: There was no reconciliation, then, between the two parties in this fight?
PAVONE: Not as of this moment. I have appealed publicly to Michael to reconsider his whole position here. And even now that Terri has died, I make that appeal to him again, because, again, this affects people way beyond Terri. This affects many, many people who are and are going to be in similar situations.
We all have to, as we grieve, examine our consciences, and say, “What are we going to do with the disabled? How are we going to treat them?”
Q: Some people say this is such a unique situation, because she didn’t have a living will, because there was some dispute about whether Michael had her intentions in mind, that this makes a bad case to base any kind of precedent on. What would you say to that?
PAVONE: Well, first of all, as far as how people should handle these situations, a healthcare proxy--namely, a person who can speak for you, if you are in a situation where you can’t speak for yourself--is much better than having a piece of paper. A piece of paper cannot interpret itself. People can begin arguing over what a piece of paper says, just as they can argue over what people said to them verbally. The best thing is to have a living person who knows you, whom you trust, whom you’ve discussed these issues with, and who then, when you are in medical circumstances in which you cannot speak for yourself, that person can get, from the doctors, the exact details of what can be done for you, and then in consultation with the clergy of their choice, make the proper decision at those moments.
So, in that sense, yes. There were elements here that led to the conflict. However, the solution is broader than that. We do have, here, a classic case of the question of throwing away disabled people. This woman was killed. She didn’t die of a terminal illness. She was killed, and it is a matter, therefore, of conscience, right now, for us all to ask: “Is this what we are going to continue to do with brain-injured people?” Because, whether they have expressed their wishes or not, obviously it can result in their death, as has happened today.
Q: Father Pavone, is the nation better off for having examined the issues that came to the fore with Terri Schiavo’s death?
PAVONE: We are much better off for having examined them. We at Priests for Life work with the clergy throughout the country. We will ensure that we continue to examine them in the teaching and preaching of the Church, and in the discussion among the people. We would be glad to be part of that whole debate as it ensues.
We who have vigorous physical and intellectual powers have much to enjoy. Severely disabled men and women may have only a few things: The voice of a good old pal. Almond-scented lotion. A favorite music CD. Warm buttery sunlight on their shoulders. The taste of strawberry jello.
Wouldn't we, who have so much to enjoy, be awfully mean to deny severely disabled men and women the few things they CAN enjoy? And death denies everything: all sensation, all pleasure, all the goodness of the body and every glimmer of the mind in this world.
May our disabled loved ones always be in the care of someone who multiples their pleasures. Someone who honors their EMBODIED spiritual nature. Someone who treasures every precious glimmer of their minds.
Mrs. Don-o
P.S. I am 24/7 caregiver for my darling 90 year old father,
who is blind and almost deaf, and whose mind is failing from vascular dementia.
We keep him well-supplied with what he likes: peanut butter and chocolate chips (eaten with a spoon), the Mozart and Bach, on tape cassette with earphones, sauerkraut-pork-and-mashed-potatoes (German comfort food), nose-to-nose contact, and hand-in-hand. He can still receive Holy Communion. If he has a little pain, he gets a little morphine. Life is good.
That's why God gives strength to the strong. So we can give sweetness to the weak.
sauerkraut-pork-and-mashed-potatoes
***
Mmmm, I love that too.
Thank you for your beautiful post. It sums up how I feel! Bless you.
It's obviously not in his character to "redeem himself a little" in anyone's eyes. He couldn't care less. I just wish this whole story had been adjudicated in bits and pieces, rather than have all these conflicting "he said, she said, she didn't say, etc. etc." gather in the last few weeks and gain critical mass only because this latest phase looked at last to be the final roundup for Terri Schiavo. We've heard SO many bad things about Michael Schiavo, that I doubt all of them could be true. If the worst of them ARE true, he should be charged with a crime, or multiple crimes, starting, I would guess, with being the chief agent and reason why his wife had a heart attack and collapsed, and went from bad to worse to worst in no time.But the other side of that story is that Terri was bulimic, and that her eating disorder brought about what became a tragic medical condition. That BOTH of these hypotheses have been put out there only testifies to the fact that there are two sides and two different agendas, rather like having two lawyers doing all the press releases for their respective audiences. My point is that all these "facts", and things like testimonies of three separate nurse's aides as to the behavior of Michael Schiavo came WAY too late to do anything more than bolster the bad opinion many already had of him. Why ALL THESE THINGS, all these conflicting histories, etc. were only trotted out at the eleventh hour is something that might be easier to understand than at first seems.
BTW, I didn't mean that MS's behavior was an ACT in the sense that he didn't really mean it. I mean that he had a role to play in this drama, and to keep himself as a counterforce to Terri's family he had to be unyielding and relentless in his opposition to them and everything they wanted. It was probably not very hard for him to do this:
there is about a decade of really bad blood between his interests and the Schindlers'.
Terri was MURDERED.
I heard on some tv show that the people in the room with Terri when she died were:
Michael Shiavo
a Shiavo brother
George Felos, lawyer
another lawyer
numerous hospice workers who "cared" for Terri
I'm sure Terri wouldn't have wanted her brother and sister and her mom and dad holding her.
This was just so wrong. Justice may never been served here on earth but justice will be served for all of us at the end.
This has been my prayer all day. Lord HAUNT this man with such guilt that he cannot sleep, walk, eat, until he confesses every single sin against the Lord. He has murdered a woman and he knows it!!
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