SuziQ, ITA with your post. It’s basically what I meant but I obviously didn’t get that across well.
mbraynard, I don’t think I was sticking up for anyone. I haven’t read all the posts in this thread and commented on those that caught my attention. I don’t consider the Pope’s death and Terri Schiavo’s death the same at all.
The sniper warfare on this thread is hilarious!
But I’m still left wondering...
One of the majestic things about the RC Church is its immutability. But sometimes, very quietly, it does change, in response to our development of more human approaches to human suffering. Our evolution as a species. (They’ve just abolished “limbo”, right? That always seemed an extraordinarily cruel concept, anyway.)
So my question is, an elderly person decides, no feeding tubes, no drugs, I will gracefully accept death. Ok, that’s clearly right and natural and the will of God.
But a 25 year old with a unspeakable, and always fatal disease cannot make the same decision?
What is the age cutoff thing here? That seems kind of fraudulent to me, especially in light of the “immutability” of Cathlic teaching.
Maybe it’s time for the Church to reconsider the right to die?
Great, cause they weren't. The pope didn't starve to death.