Pope John Paul And Terry Schiavo
By Doug Hagin (04/07/05)
I was not going to write about Terry Schiavo. I was going to be the only columnist across this fruited plane not to express my views on this tragic story. However, after the death of Pope John Paul II I have to write about the death of Terry Schiavo.
Now what exactly do the deaths of Pope John Paul II and Terry Schiavo have in common? Very simply put these two events make very clear how close we are to actually embracing this so-called death with dignity nonsense we have heard so much about.
Pope John Paul II did perhaps the very best job of any public figure I can recall of expressing how much each of our lives are worth. This man of great faith and sincere compassion taught us all a tremendous lesson in valuing human life, and it is a lesson we must never ever forget.
With the passing of the Holy Father, we who do value each human life must redouble our efforts to continue his work of teaching the importance of true compassion. In doing this, we might be able to offset the growing message from many that human life only matters and is only valuable if it meets their standard of quality of life.
This message is, as the beautiful pro-life message of the Pope, is based on compassion. The compassion the “death with dignity” crowd espouses, however, is not compassionate in the least. Instead of respecting an individual’s right to refuse medical care, or have a living will, which expresses their wishes in cases of terminal illnesses and when to disconnect life-support, the “death with dignity” voices are apparently willing to define for us all exactly what dignity is.
There is a great danger in this type of thinking. How far removed are we, as a nation, removed from legislating what constitutes a sufficient quality of life? Certainly, anyone listening during the debate that swirled around the Schiavo case would have good reason to be concerned. Here was Terry Schiavo, being starved to death and dehydrated to death, yet, despite the claims of the death with dignity crowd, her wishes were never known.
Yes, yes, her husband declared loudly that she had expressed a hope never to be in a persistent vegetative state, and on a feeding tube. Yes, several courts supported his claim, largely due to his being Terry’s legal guardian. However, Terry Sciavo left no legal documents expressing her wishes. Her family and friends were certain she would never desire her feeding tube to be removed. Several medical professionals also expressed their opinions that Terry was not in a vegetative state. So, basically or judicial system decided the word of her husband was sufficient reason to pull Terry Schiavo’s feeding tube and starve and dehydrate her to death.
Are we willing to allow one persons word to seal the death sentence for another who cannot voice their wishes? In fact, this is what the Schiavo case amounted to didn’t it? Of course my question about whether or not we are, as a society, willing to allow one person to order the death of another who cannot speak for themselves has already been answered. We have in fact adopted and practiced such a national policy for 32 years now.
Terry Schiavo, in the end, was judged no differently than millions of unborn babies have been. Like them, she could not speak for herself. Like them, she could not feed herself. Like them, she could not care for herself. Moreover, like them she had people willing to care for her and love her. In addition, like them she was denied that opportunity because those who support euthanasia and abortion judged her as something less than fully human.
Yes I realize it is true that not all those supported puling Terry’s feeding tube were pro-choice, and not all those opposed to it were all pro-life. The voices calling for the tubes removal were, however, closely akin to those, which support abortion rights.
Those who defend abortion always dismiss the unborn child as either not human, or not alive, or at most, they dismiss it as only potential human life. Likewise those who supported starving Terry Schiavo by and large argued she was brain dead, which was of course false, that she was “not there” and was in fact dead already.
Those who defend abortions often use the logic that the unborn child will be better off not being born. The child might grow up in poverty, or might not be wanted, or might be retarded, or might be born with a disability and so on. They prejudge the human life even before birth to justify destroying it.
Likewise, those who argued that Terry Schiavo should not be sustained declared that there was no way she would wish to live like that. They avowed she did not have a sufficient quality of life and was therefore better off dead. How damned compassionate of them.
As stated earlier there is no true compassion in these views. Only we can determine what our quality of life is. No one can or should make such a determination for us. Living wills are a tool we can use to make our wishes clear about end of life issues. The true definition of death with dignity is when we decide for ourselves when to refuse care, disconnect a machine, or pull a feeding tube.
The very last thing we should seek is a country where we allow this decision to be made for us by those who do not value each human life. Yet this is the road we are beginning to move down. First the unborn were deemed not worthy of the most fundamental of rights, now those judged by some to be in a vegetative state can be starved. So who is next?
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