Posted on 07/01/2007 3:27:40 AM PDT by 8mmMauser
Edited on 07/02/2007 4:50:59 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
That's the question Bobby Schindler asked in the case involving Jesse Ramirez, the Arizona man whose case paralleled that of Schindler's sister, Terri Schiavo, until Ramirez woke up. The Arizona Republic reports:
...Bobby Schindler of the Florida-based Terri Schindler Shiavo Foundation placed the blame on a medical establishment quick to dismiss patients with brain injuries.Why is Jesse alive? His family sought legal intervention with the help of the Alliance Defense Fund:
Schindler is the brother of Terri Schiavo, a brain-damaged Florida woman who died in 2005 after a decades-long court battle.
"What is the rush?" he asked. "This is not the first time we've heard of cases like this where doctors want to write off the chance of recovery, and the family, when they're told this, will make a decision to end a person's life.
"In the case of Mr. Ramirez, he'd be dead now."
His siblings and parents refused to give him up for dead, and today, Jesse Ramirez is alive and conscious.
Two weeks ago, he was the center of a family battling over of whether he should live or die.
Now, he can hug and kiss, nod his head, answer yes and no questions, give a thumbs-up sign and sit in a chair.
Related:
A Miracle for Jesse Ramirez and His Family
Jesse Ramirez Conscious, Moved To Rehab Facility
But what he means is that Congress is wasting their time doing the oversight inherent to that body -- because, as far as Snow is concerned, Congress represents the White House and not the American people -- and that they should spend more time helping Bush in his failed national agenda or, like their GOP predecessors, focusing on issues like Terri Schiavo or flag burning.
Snow Perfectly Conveys White House's Total Arrogance
8mm
This little leftist princess dares to preach morality? Her only ethic is socialism. She was so obnoxious that one of her subjects tried to punch her camera.
She's just as obnoxious and condescending in print.
Art requires no discipline, no talent, no morals, no reference to the truth and no brains whatsoever. Naturally that's where the Left flocks. Like, wow!, they don't have to work and what's really neat is, sometimes people throw change in their guitar case.
Art is all "Let's Pretend." But then, socialism itself is "Let's Pretend."
Symbolism, they love symbolism. Drive a Prius where everyone can see, park it in the evening and use the SUV for serious driving. Their world evolves around symbols, handy replacements for facts.
ROME, July 26, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI's question and answer session with Italian clergy Tuesday has been reported on by the world's media, noting mostly his references to evolution and care for the planet. Most media have failed, however, to note that in his remarks on the necessity of care for the earth, the Pope explicitly noted the necessity of "absolute respect" for human life.
"We can all see today that man could destroy the foundation of his existence, the earth," he said. "Therefore we can no longer just simply do whatever we want with this earth which has been entrusted to us." We must, he said, "respect the inner laws of creation, of the earth, to learn these laws and obey these laws if we are to survive."
Media Misses the Point: Pope Says Have Concern for the Planet Yes, but a Greater Concern for Life
8mm
For the record, a much younger Arianna Stassinopoulos had a conservative bent and wrote powerfully against the excesses of feminism. That was before she married Michael Huffington and got used to having heaps of money and status. Look at her now -- divorced, rich and mean as a serpent.
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 26, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - For weeks the US Food and Drug Administration has been warning the American public about tainted Chinese imports of contaminated pet food, poisonous toothpaste, and an outbreak of botulism. However the federal agency has failed thus far to issue warnings over the possible contamination of RU-486, a chemical abortion pill made exclusively in China, which has led to at least 6 documented deaths in North America and hundreds of severe adverse effects in women.
As the Chinese scandals began to unfold, pro-life Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ) and co-chairman of the Bipartisan Pro-life Caucus called on the FDA to investigate Danco, a company established in the Cayman Islands solely for the purpose of selling its only product, RU-486, in the United States. Smith wanted to ascertain its relationship with the Shanghai based manufacturing company, Hua Lin Pharmaceuticals.
Massive Chinese Recalls, but FDA Silent Over RU-486 Chinese Manufacturers
8mm
New York, NY (LifeNews.com) -- Amnesty International upset millions of pro-life supporters months ago when it decided to take a pro-abortion position after decades of neutrality. Any decision on abortion was supposed to come at an AI leadership conference in August in Mexico City -- but with the meeting on the horizon, a change of heart isn't expected.
The biennial meeting of the world's foremost human rights group begins August 11 but one of its leaders says its unlikely AI will backtrack on the abortion decision.
Amnesty International Unlikely to Drop Newfound Pro-Abortion Position
8mm
Baton Rouge, LA (LifeNews.com) -- Just one day after a grand jury decided not to indict Dr. Anna Pou on charges that she allegedly euthanized patients in the dreadful aftermath following Hurricane Katrina, the state's attorney general will not drop the case. Attorney General Charles Foti has asked a state judge to release previously sealed documents.
Foti wants the judge to release documents that has been used in the investigation of the deaths at Memorial Medical Center. The documents were sealed when Foti gave Judge Calvin Johnson the search warrants, subpoena requests and other records in January 2006.
Louisiana Attorney General Won't Drop Hurricane Katrina Euthanasia Case
8mm
When you enter the Valley of the Shadow of Death, things change.
Tony Snow
Commentator and broadcaster Tony Snow announced that he had colon cancer in 2005. Following surgery and chemo-therapy, Snow joined the Bush administration in April 2006 as press secretary. Unfortunately, on March 23 Snow, 51, a husband and father of three, announced that the cancer had recurred, with tumors found in his abdomen—leading to surgery in April, followed by more chemotherapy. Snow went back to work in the White House Briefing Room on May 30. CT asked Snow what spiritual lessons he has been learning through the ordeal.
Blessings arrive in unexpected packages—in my case, cancer.
Those of us with potentially fatal diseases—and there are millions in America today—find ourselves in the odd position of coping with our mortality while trying to fathom God's will. Although it would be the height of presumption to declare with confidence What It All Means, Scripture provides powerful hints and consolations.
The first is that we shouldn't spend too much time trying to answer the why questions: Why me? Why must people suffer? Why can't someone else get sick? We can't answer such things, and the questions themselves often are designed more to express our anguish than to solicit an answer.
I don't know why I have cancer, and I don't much care. It is what it is—a plain and indisputable fact. Yet even while staring into a mirror darkly, great and stunning truths begin to take shape. Our maladies define a central feature of our existence: We are fallen. We are imperfect. Our bodies give out.
But despite this—because of it—God offers the possibility of salvation and grace. We don't know how the narrative of our lives will end, but we get to choose how to use the interval between now and the moment we meet our Creator face-to-face.
Second, we need to get past the anxiety. The mere thought of dying can send adrenaline flooding through your system. A dizzy, unfocused panic seizes you. Your heart thumps; your head swims. You think of nothingness and swoon. You fear partings; you worry about the impact on family and friends. You fidget and get nowhere.
To regain footing, remember that we were born not into death, but into life—and that the journey continues after we have finished our days on this earth. We accept this on faith, but that faith is nourished by a conviction that stirs even within many nonbelieving hearts—an intuition that the gift of life, once given, cannot be taken away. Those who have been stricken enjoy the special privilege of being able to fight with their might, main, and faith to live—fully, richly, exuberantly—no matter how their days may be numbered.
Third, we can open our eyes and hearts. God relishes surprise. We want lives of simple, predictable ease—smooth, even trails as far as the eye can see—but God likes to go off-road. He provokes us with twists and turns. He places us in predicaments that seem to defy our endurance and comprehension—and yet don't. By his love and grace, we persevere. The challenges that make our hearts leap and stomachs churn invariably strengthen our faith and grant measures of wisdom and joy we would not experience otherwise.
'You Have Been Called'
Picture yourself in a hospital bed. The fog of anesthesia has begun to wear away. A doctor stands at your feet; a loved one holds your hand at the side. "It's cancer," the healer announces.
The natural reaction is to turn to God and ask him to serve as a cosmic Santa. "Dear God, make it all go away. Make everything simpler." But another voice whispers: "You have been called." Your quandary has drawn you closer to God, closer to those you love, closer to the issues that matter—and has dragged into insignificance the banal concerns that occupy our "normal time."
There's another kind of response, although usually short-lived—an inexplicable shudder of excitement, as if a clarifying moment of calamity has swept away everything trivial and tinny, and placed before us the challenge of important questions.
The moment you enter the Valley of the Shadow of Death, things change. You discover that Christianity is not something doughy, passive, pious, and soft. Faith may be the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. But it also draws you into a world shorn of fearful caution. The life of belief teems with thrills, boldness, danger, shocks, reversals, triumphs, and epiphanies. Think of Paul, traipsing though the known world and contemplating trips to what must have seemed the antipodes (Spain), shaking the dust from his sandals, worrying not about the morrow, but only about the moment.
There's nothing wilder than a life of humble virtue—for it is through selflessness and service that God wrings from our bodies and spirits the most we ever could give, the most we ever could offer, and the most we ever could do.
Finally, we can let love change everything. When Jesus was faced with the prospect of crucifixion, he grieved not for himself, but for us. He cried for Jerusalem before entering the holy city. From the Cross, he took on the cumulative burden of human sin and weakness, and begged for forgiveness on our behalf.
We get repeated chances to learn that life is not about us—that we acquire purpose and satisfaction by sharing in God's love for others. Sickness gets us partway there. It reminds us of our limitations and dependence. But it also gives us a chance to serve the healthy. A minister friend of mine observes that people suffering grave afflictions often acquire the faith of two people, while loved ones accept the burden of two people's worries and fears.
Learning How to Live
Most of us have watched friends as they drifted toward God's arms not with resignation, but with peace and hope. In so doing, they have taught us not how to die, but how to live. They have emulated Christ by transmitting the power and authority of love.
I sat by my best friend's bedside a few years ago as a wasting cancer took him away. He kept at his table a worn Bible and a 1928 edition of the Book of Common Prayer. A shattering grief disabled his family, many of his old friends, and at least one priest. Here was a humble and very good guy, someone who apologized when he winced with pain because he thought it made his guest uncomfortable. He retained his equanimity and good humor literally until his last conscious moment. "I'm going to try to beat [this cancer]," he told me several months before he died. "But if I don't, I'll see you on the other side."
His gift was to remind everyone around him that even though God doesn't promise us tomorrow, he does promise us eternity—filled with life and love we cannot comprehend—and that one can in the throes of sickness point the rest of us toward timeless truths that will help us weather future storms.
Through such trials, God bids us to choose: Do we believe, or do we not? Will we be bold enough to love, daring enough to serve, humble enough to submit, and strong enough to acknowledge our limitations? Can we surrender our concern in things that don't matter so that we might devote our remaining days to things that do?
When our faith flags, he throws reminders in our way. Think of the prayer warriors in our midst. They change things, and those of us who have been on the receiving end of their petitions and intercessions know it.
It is hard to describe, but there are times when suddenly the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, and you feel a surge of the Spirit. Somehow you just know: Others have chosen, when talking to the Author of all creation, to lift us up—to speak of us!
This is love of a very special order. But so is the ability to sit back and appreciate the wonder of every created thing. The mere thought of death somehow makes every blessing vivid, every happiness more luminous and intense. We may not know how our contest with sickness will end, but we have felt the ineluctable touch of God.
What is man that Thou art mindful of him? We don't know much, but we know this: No matter where we are, no matter what we do, no matter how bleak or frightening our prospects, each and every one of us, each and every day, lies in the same safe and impregnable place—in the hollow of God's hand.
Is it just me or do you get the impression everytime he speaks that Tony Snow just can’t wait to go back to private life.
The sulphurous fumes got thick in the previous thread. I could only marvel at the raging of the Visitors as they twisted the truth and attacked the normal people.
It seems clear that once a person accepts the premises of euthanasia and "right to die," the effects are instantly toxic to the soul.
21 Blessed are ye that hunger now: for you shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for you shall laugh.
22 Blessed shall you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you and shall reproach you and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake.
I really don’t know. I do know that he took the job in good faith and with full understanding that he would be speaking into the gale. Whatever his path, he has my best wishes.
Tony Snow is a very decent guy. It must be tough on him to not be able to express all he would wish.
At least one new troll is floating around. It is a matter of time before said troll appears on more of our threads.
It was nothing compared to the IVF thread I posted the other day when someone called ME a eugenicist.
You could always invite said troll. . .
God bless them all for the truth they promote!
FRONT ROYAL, VA, July 27, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer, president of Human Life International, the world's largest pro-life organization, has stated that abortion is the same bloodthirsty and ritual sacrifice of babies to a demonic god that occurred throughout history and across cultures.
Euteneuer speaks from years of experience as a pro-life activist and an exorcist. According to the HLI website, he has participated in many prayer vigils, pilgrimages, and picketing events since his early priesthood. As HLI President, an organization that networks pro-life activists in 80 countries across the globe, he has visited more than fifty countries and traveled over 700,000 miles. In addition, he has been featured by countless national and international media and received several notable awards.
Abortion is a "Perfect demonic system" says Human Life International President
8mm
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.