48 posts tagged “disability”
From Ruth at her blog Wheelie Catholic:
I awoke this morning to an MSNBC article about the efforts of one man to walk again after acquiring a spinal cord injury.
The article began with the words "It was only a chair, but it became his purgatory".
Make no mistake about this: I applaud the efforts and hard work of the individual in question. That's not at issue here, of course.
But to write an article saying that this man could have no life until he walked again is inaccurate. To write that a wheelchair is someone's purgatory (not a quote from the interviewed person) needs to be addressed. Why?
Because more damage is done to the perception of disability over bowls of Cheerio due to media coverage than anywhere else. Not only that, but this article ignores several facts that are well known in the spinal cord community....
...I'd like to address another myth in this article: not all people with disabilities are miserable like this guy was.
The chair stood for all that was lost: A promising career, a vigorous life spent fishing the lakes of North Carolina, future plans conjured when things were perfect — plans that seemed impossible now.
Okay let's explore this. I know people in wheelchairs who fish on lakes. I've played tennis from a wheelchair, work and consider my life productive and meaningful. From a wheelchair. There's a whole world of people in wheelchairs out there who are living their life. It's ridiculous to present living with a spinal cord injury as a death sentence in this day and age.
I appreciated the irony tonight while watching 20/20. No, 'appreciate' is not the correct word. I noticed irony. Or incongruency, rather.
I remember a movie called Twillight of the Golds about a family with a pregnant daughter whose baby tests positive for the 'gay gene'. Abortion is considered and recommended for this pregnancy by her family and husband, and, of course, we the audience come to understand how immoral that idea would be. (And, of course, it would be quite immoral to end an unborn life because it may be carrying the so-called 'gay gene'.)
I was thinking of that movie while watching this 20/20 segment and then watched the next story on this same episode tonight about a man who surprised his parents by being born with no limbs.
I was thinking about the irony (or incongruency) that the popular, pc public wouldn't think twice if this man's parents had known he would be born with this kind of disability and chosen to terminate that pregnency. And how silent that public remains about the fact that the idea of euthenasia for such infants is creeping upon us here the US as it has in Europe. And how that same public would cry out if abortion, etc. were to be considered for pregnancies where the 'gay gene' was detected- as they should cry out, of course. But they remain silent for other 'kinds' of pregnancies being terminated.
Ironic, or incongruent.
From the video:
In a collective decision, every voice counts, either by its rhetoric or by its silence.
Does life have absolute value simply because it is human?
We have to answer that question. We have to. We have to.
We have to realize that bioethicists today, SAY NO. We have to become educated, at the very least aware, of what the consequences have been and will be of them saying no! We have to.
What do we say, Christ followers? How do we answer this question? A simple yes or no will suffice- for now. It's a start.
Most of us are already aware when we listen to God and let Him put His Truth in our hearts that the once taken for granted sanctity of human life is no longer a given, we will grieve for the life that has been lost, for the lives that will be lost, and for what our part has been. And it will hurt.
I know, believe me, I know, it's hard to look at what's happening. It makes us have to do all that 'thinking'. I know it's 'uncomfortable' when we seek God's Truth in this matter because we have to 'feel stuff'. We might offend people, even our friends, and be contraversial. We might even be called to speak out, make a stand.
You don't have to watch all of these videos. They are of a lecture given by Wesley Smith at Trinity Law School on the value of human life and what is happening in the field of ethics today. Watching all four will take 2 hours total of your time. So, you don't have to watch all of both videos.
But you do have to answer the question- Does life have absolute value simply because it is human? You have to.
Today at church we had the opportunity to hear some testimonies from people who had experienced healing from God this week. It was great to hear their stories of the power of God.
However, I was reminded, overwhelming so, of how much people with illnesses and disabilities are needed at my church. Yes, in part to see the glory of God revealed when He chooses to heal some of them. But also, to see the glory of God revealed when He chooses not to.
As the men and women told their stories of healing as quickly as possible with only so much time alloted them, focus and attention seemed to be only on the physical symptoms of their illness or emotional pain, with a quick declaration that God delivered them. As if they were saying, on the external, God healed my body or delivered me from this sinful outward behavior.
I know there was much more to their healings than just the external, and, again they only had so much time to speak. But what I need to see, as a member of my church, is what is happening with their hearts. Where is their heart as God is healing them? Where are they spiritually? What is God doing in their sanctifying process of making them holy? Is this physical healing a reflection of that transformation or is it something that God has given them for the sole reason of blessing them? Will this physical healing press them into deeper relationship and trust with God?
In addition to those who have had physical healing in their lives, I also need to hear from people who still struggle with a physical or mental illness or a physical or mental disability, yet are being transformed into the likeness of God for the glory of God, in faith and trust that the grace of God is sufficient in their weakness.
Yes, God does heal people sometimes of physical disability, of the chemical imbalances of mental illness, etc., and for that we thank Him and praise Him! But, He is not only concerned with the physical! He looks upon the heart! He may or may not choose to heal the leper, make the lame man walk, or give sight to the blind woman. He does not promise physical healing.
But He does promise life and life abundantly, which is found in the graceful relationship with His one and only Son. He promises new identity, freedom from sin, and transformed spirits.
Savation is for everyone!
He goes even further and uses those He chooses not to heal for His glory in making the church better! With the suffering around us, God gives us the gift of compassion and love- if we will take it. With those who struggle with their physical bodies or mental disabilities who trust in the sufficiency of God's grace, we learn to rely on that same sufficiency in our own weaknesses or when our time for suffering comes. And God gets all the glory!
Girl Once Comatose and Scheduled for Euthanasia Will Testify Against Attacker
Two and half years ago, Haleigh Poutre, now 14, was brutally beaten into a coma. After custody was taken from her stepfather, the man who beat her nearly to death, she was made a ward of the state of Massachusetts. The state sought to remove her life support only six days after obtaining custody. Her stepfather fought to keep her alive, probably to avoid murder charges, and the slowness of the court system gave Haleigh time to start showing signs of alertness.
From the article:
Fortunately for Haleigh, the slowness of the court appeals process spared her life. The court made its final decision to euthanize her in January, 2006, by which time she was showing signs of alertness. Just days before doctors were going to remove her life support systems she began breathing on her own, and the Department of Social Services halted plans to remove her feeding tube.
Haleigh is now in rehabilitation and is enrolled at the day school at Franciscan Hospital for Children. She can communicate by using a keyboard and computer and can speak some words.
The irony in this case is that Jason Strickland, who faces multiple assault charges, but in the long run ultimately saved Haleigh's life, may be convicted by Haleigh's testimony against him, while the Massachusetts Department of Social Services, which sought to kill her after being told she wouldn't have a "meaningful" life, won't be at court.
It seems those with disabilities have been a part of us, a part of the church, all along. In our music, of all things. Three examples:
From Citizenlink.com (Thanks, Guitpicken, for the tip.)
Obama Calls Vote to Help Terri Schiavo Biggest Mistake
'Whether it's abortion or end-of-life issues, he's been consistently anti-life.'
During the 20th Democratic presidential debate Tuesday, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama said the one vote he would take back was his 2005 U.S. Senate vote to help save the life of Terri Schiavo, a brain-injured Florida woman.
We adjourned with a unanimous agreement that eventually allowed Congress to interject itself into that decision-making process of the families," Obama said. "It wasn't something I was comfortable with, but it was not something that I stood on the floor and stopped. And I think that was a mistake."
Schiavo was not dying nor terminally ill; she was not brain-dead nor in a coma. Yet for seven years, her husband, Michael, sought to have her feeding tube removed. Congress intervened toward the end, but it was not enough. Schiavo died March 31, 2005, after 13 days of court-ordered dehydration and starvation.
Jill Stanek, a pro-life speaker and blogger, called Obama "utterly pro-death."
"He lives in 'opposite world,' where he is an environmentalist, to the extreme, and very pro-animal," she said. "But when it comes to the sanctity of human life, he takes every stand against it, up to, and including, babies who have been aborted alive.
"His priorities are completely unintelligible."
When asked Tuesday which vote she would take back, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., said she would not vote for the Iraq war again.
Tuesday wasn't the first time Obama talked about his "mistake."
During an April 2007 debate, he said: "I think professionally the biggest mistake that I made was when I first arrived in the Senate. There was a debate about Terri Schiavo, and a lot of us, including me, left the Senate with a bill that allowed Congress to intrude where it shouldn't have.”
Bruce Hausknecht, judicial analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said Obama has been disingenuous.
"How can Obama reconcile his cavalier dismissal of Terri Schiavo's predicament as a 'family matter,' when he has stated he wants to appoint judges who are 'going to protect people who may be vulnerable in the political process, the outsider, the minority, those who are vulnerable, those who don't have a lot of clout'?
"Whether it's abortion or end-of-life issues," Hausknecht said, "he's been consistently anti-life."
