Today is the fourth anniversary of the death of Terri Schiavo.  I don't really know what to say about it, except that I guess I just wanted to acknowledge it. 

TerriSchiavo

I miss her, this stranger.  I miss praying for her.

Four years ago, a real woman's life was taken from her under guise of compassion and alleged choice.  She was not brain dead.  Though living with a profound cognitive disability, she was not completely void of cognitive awareness (a 'vegetable' being the derogatory term), although, that would not have made her any less of a person nor any less worthy of care had she been.

We have a terrible fear of acquiring a severe disability, and we have a terrible fear of those with severe and profound disabilities.  Until that fear is resolved, the prejudice that leads to institutionalization and this kind of murder will not end.

Before we blame the secular bioethicists and the 'liberal media', though, perhaps we who call ourselves Christians should look at our own ungodly reactions to people like Terri Schiavo, that is to people who are experiencing pain and suffering.

Frederick K.C. Price of Crenshaw Christian Center:

We don't allow sickness in our home." (Frederick K.C. Price, Is Healing for All? (Tulsa: Harrison House, 1979), 20

 ... how can you glorify God in your body, when it doesn't function right? How can you glorify God? How can He get glory when your body doesn't even work? ... What makes you think the Holy Ghost wants to live inside a body where He can't see out through the windows and He can't hear with the ears? What makes you think the Holy Spirit wants to live inside of a physical body where the limbs and the organs and the cells do not function right? ... And what makes you think He wants to live in a temple where He can't see out of the eyes, and He can't walk with the feet, and He can't move with the hand? ... The only eyes that he has that are in the earth realm are the eyes that are in the body. If He can't see out of them then God's gonna be limited he's not going to be helped...” applause (Frederick K.C. Price, “Is God Glorified Through Sickness?” (Los Angeles: Crenshaw Christian Center, n.d.), audiotape #FP605)

In John 5 we read about a man who had been sick for 38 years sitting by the pool of Bethesda for the opportunity to climb into the pool after an angel had stirred it and be healed.  When Jesus asked him, "Do you want to be healed?" vs 6), the man replied, ""Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me." (vs 7) After that, verses 8-9 say, Jesus said to him, "Get up, take up your bed, and walk." And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.

That's basically all these verses say about this man's healing.  However, both Joel Osteen, who often makes claim to the idea that being healed is one's own responsibility by believing a certain way, in his book, Your Best Life Now and Joyce Meyer in her book, Eight Ways to Keep the Devil Under Your Feet claim that this man lay around the pool feeling sorry for himself and making excuses.  Says Osteen:

If you're serious about being well, if you really want to be made physically and emotionally whole, you must get up and get moving with your life.  No more lying around feeling sorry for yourself."

Says Meyer:

I would think that after thirty-eight years, a diligent, determined person could have crawled over to the edge of that pool.  Even if that man had only moved an inch a year, it seems that in thirty-eight years, he ought to have been able to get close enough to the edge to just roll over into the water when it was stirred up."

And here is where fear and prejudice of disability seem to come through in Meyer's words:

Thirty eight years is a long time to lie somewhere, waiting for somebody to do something for you.  I would have been on the edge of the that pool, and next year when the angel came around, when that water started bubbling, I would have fallen in and said, 'Either I'm going to get healed or I'm going to die, but I'm not staying like this'" (emphasis mine)"

And dare we forget Todd Bentley?  Bentley spent the summer parading people with illnesses and disabilities on stage, either physically assaulting them or telling stories about how he had physically assaulted people at other times, mocking them, and proclaiming miracles for them, though not one single miracle could be verified by the secular media.  (Go to YouTube, search for Todd Bentley, and watch the videos for yourself.)

These are just a very few examples of well known Christians' 'appreciation' for suffering.  This is sad.

Thankfully, they do not represent all of us.

I read these words today in Andrew Comisky's book, Pursuing Sexual Wholeness:

 

Pursing Sexual Wholeness

In this lifetime Jesus does not intend to satisfy very craving of the soul, to remove every weakness.  For our deep longings are for Him above all else.  That longing within us is not merely the result of personal brokenness or the influence of family and friends: it's intrinsic to our status as the created, as children disposed to grow upward to the Creator, through His love. Our fallenness highlights the folly of attempting to secure ourselves on the earth, through the creature.  The Father employs the aches and longings that remain to keep us focused on Himself. 

But His purposes don't end there.  He desires to employ that which has yet to be healed as an avenue of His grace.  Through the wounds and deprivations  that He indwells, God creates in us a deep wellsring of compassion- His heart- toward others who are broken.  He graces us and intends to use us to grace others." 

Though Comisky is speaking to those who struggle with sexual brokeness, the same can be said for all Christians who want their best life now and expect bodily perfection and wordly prosperity.  We are all broken.  This brokeness forces us to find our strengh and sufficiency in Him.  We then, in turn, offer the same undeserved mercy and grace God offers to us to others, to people like Terri Schiavo, caring for and protecting their life.

It's the way of the Cross.  It's the way of Christ.

From West Palm Beach Florida:

Family's Fight Over Feeding Tube Reminiscent Of Schiavo Case

Husband, Mom At Odds Over Tube

A Florida woman put on a feeding tube after she had a stroke is at the center of a court case similar to the dispute over whether Terri Schiavo should be kept alive.

Karen Weber's husband wants to have her feeding tube removed and have her transferred to a hospital ward, where she would likely die. He claims that his 57-year-old wife is in a vegetative state, but Weber's family is fighting to keep her alive, arguing she's alert and responsive...

...A judge in Weber's case has issued an injunction prohibiting the feeding tube's removal while a committee determines the woman's competency. She does not have a living will and can not talk.

Her husband, Raymond Weber, said he doesn't want this to become a media event, but her mother, Martha Tatro, said she refuses to let her daughter die.

Read complete story here.

Now, I have some questions.  For one, is this woman alert and responsive or not?  If so then she is not in a so-called 'vegetative state'.  I understand that due to privacy laws, Mrs. Weber's doctors may not explain her condition to the media.  But either she is or she isn't.

(I use the word 'so-called' because the terminology of vegetative state is ridiculous and undignified.  An individual in such a state is not a plant in the corner being kept watered occasionally.  He or she is someone who has lost cognitive neurological function and awareness of the environment but retains noncognitive function and a preserved sleep-wake cycle.  In other words, he or she is still a person, one with profound cognitive disabilities.) 

Second question, since there many cases of misdiagnosis of and treatment for this state, such as the sleeping pill Zolpidem which can temporarily revive people in a so-called permanent vegetative state, or one similar, to the point where they can have conversations, have these treatments been attempted?

Thirdly, why is removing her feeding tube even an option.  Mrs. Weber is alive, with brain function and breathing on her own.  A feeding tube has technically legally been deemed life support lately, but unlike removing a breathing tube of someone with absolutely no brain activity who will instantly die when that breathing tube is removed because he or she is already dead, pulling out the feeding tube of Mrs. Weber is not 'letting her die'.  It is refusing to feed a woman who needs help eating; it is willful neglect.  It is death by neglect.  It is murder.

Lastly, what difference does it make whether she is in a 'vegetative state' or not?  What if Mrs. Weber never regains awareness of her surroundings or even of her very existence? What if she remains totally and completely dependent on others the rest of her life for every aspect of her life? 

I wonder if a life like hers is testimony that a person's worth to us and to God is not at all dependent on abilities, but on simply the fact that she is a fellow human being.  Now is our chance to show we believe that idea when we tell our children, "God loves you for who you are, not for what you can do" by protesting this woman's murder, caring for those most in need of caring around us, and caring for their families.

Some say that it would be undignified to 'allow' Mrs. Weber to remain alive in such an event.  However, is it not more undignified to refer to her as a vegetable, rescind her status of personhood, and starve her to death?

Who is she to me?  Why do I seem so interested with her story on this blog?

Yesterday marked the third anniversary of Terri Schiavo's death.  I remember hearing bits and pieces of her story months before she was killed and trying really hard to not hear about it.  To not become aware of all the facts about human euthanasia, and so forth.  I knew what would happen.  I would began to feel passionate again.  And passion hurts.

I had been living a life where I had allowed my heart to become numb to things of the Truth.  But both the threat to Mrs. Schiavo's life and God calling me out of a life of lies about who I was and Who God was coincided.  At the end of Mrs. Schiavo's life, God had me the begining of a place of honesty and healing.

One night, before the courts handed down the final decision about Mrs. Schiavo's fate, I couldn't hold back anymore.  I began to beg God Almighty for Terri's life.  In obedience to God, I conceded to the Truth that human life was sacred, both Terri's and mine, and talked to God in a way I hadn't done in years.  A desperate sort of 'real' prayer.

That prayer changed my life.  I would slowly allow God into my heart in times of desperation after that.  I see life differently now, as something that belongs to God.  Its worth is dependent on God's value of it, not man's judgment of it.

I feel very attached to Terri Schiavo.  And indebted.

I think another reason I feel connected to Mrs. Schiavo, is because I've known people like her, or with disabilities similar to hers, anyway.  In fact, at the time of Mrs. Schiavo's death I had just quit a job working with a man and a woman who also had profound cognitive disabilities, used feeding tubes, etc.  Only they had been born with their disabilities.  So, when I see pictures of videos of Mrs. Schiavo I think of those people I cared for and cared about.

I grieve for Mrs. Schiavo and for our numb-to-the-Truth nation and what we have done.  What will become of us?

Let there be tears for what you have done. Let there be sorrow and deep grief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up in honor.  James 1:9-10

There is so much talk out there in the world about suffering.  There is so much talk out there about 'those people' who are *suffering.  There is so much talk out there about how to help 'those people' who are suffering by ending their suffering.  There is so much talk out there about ending 'those people' who are suffering.

The logic these days (these last days?), in this distorted world, is ending a person's suffering is worth ending the person.

I am wondering if we jump on the euthanasia, doctor assisted suicide bandwagon because we don't really know 'those people'?  They aren't in our lives.  I didn't know Mrs. Schaivo. 

What if I did?  What if she weren't just the woman I read about online or whose story I watched on the evening news?  What if she weren't the woman whose disability was described differently in each article or story, as if reporters or bloggers couldn't exactly explain what was 'wrong' with her?

What if she had been someone in my life, say a friend or a family member or a woman I cared for as a caregiver?  Would I be so easily tempted to talk about her in the abstract and form opinions about her based on different articles all written from different points of view?

If I had a relationship with Mrs. Schiavo, would it make it easier to recognize her life's worth, her dignity, and her personhood and do my very best to see that she has the best care and support and found a way to see that her bridge to Mrs. Schiavo and community stayed strong?  Or in my pain of believing someone I love was suffering, would I accept the distorted philosophy of euthanasia?

What if I had a relationship with Mrs. Schiavo's family?  Would I, in my fear of Mrs. Schiavo's disabilities, encourage her hurting family in the route of euthanasia?  Or would I offer real, practical support, by way of sharing in the care of Mrs. Schiavo and of the family?

What if relationship with people with serious and profound disabilities and their families took those with disabilities out of the abstract in debate about human life and made them real people to us?  Would we see ending their 'suffering' worth ending their lives?  Or would we find a way to relate to them in their suffering, and instead of trying to end it their suffering at any means, would we recognize suffering as a shared human experience?

*Side, but important note, many with disabilities do not see themselves as actually 'suffering' in the way that suffering is used in the media and politics.  They see their lives as normal, albeit with some hard things in their lives, but they resent that the rest of us see them as 'suffering'.

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.

Terri Schiavo's Family Launches New Radio Program

From Citizenlink.com (Thanks, Guitpicken, for the tip.)

Obama Calls Vote to Help Terri Schiavo Biggest Mistake

 

by Jennifer Mesko, managing editor

'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."

A 23 year-old woman may be killed, may be killed the way that Terri Schiavo was killed.  Her feeding tube would be removed, thus resulting in starvation and dehydration, and then death.  Words like 'persistent vegetative state' and 'life support' are being thrown around regarding her story, but the only life support this woman uses is a feeding tube. 

Why do the doctors and some of her family members want to end her life? Why was Mrs. Schaivo killed?  I don't know.  Because she was suffering too much?  Because she wouldn't have wanted to live like this?  I really don't understand the argument, and I'm tired of pretending I do.

These women are fairly easy targets for euthanasia.  They cannot speak for themselves.  The doctors and lawyers and some of their family members who advocate removal of the feeding tube put themselves in the sufferers' positions and can't imagine living like that themselves, maybe, thus acting on some sort of distorted empathy?  We as a society judge the only alternative to 'poor quality of life' to be death, instead of making efforts to actually improve someone's life?  Dare I say, the cost of the feeding tube, other medicines, and around the clock personal care?

In Canada an eighty-four year old man's feeding tube may be removed, also.  He like the women is not dying.  He incurred a brain injury in 2003, and has been in the hospital since October due to pnemonia.  His body is not shutting down, and he is benefitting from the provision of fluid and food.  Unlike the women, the decision to take this man's life is not being made by any of his family, but rather the hospital where is receiving care. 

This man and his family are Orthodox Jews, and in an affidavit, local Rabbi Y. Charytan, said Orthodox Jews believe "life must be extended as long as possible and we are not allowed to hasten death."  A lawyer for Grace General Hospital, however, told the court that doctors "have the sole right to make decisions about treatment - even if it goes against a patient's religious beliefs."

These people are alive.  A feeding tube is not an 'extreme measure of life support'.  It's the way they eat.  As the 84 year old man's family's lawyar said, "...I don't see the difference if [a doctor] came in and put a pillow over his face."

I'm baffled.  This is really happening.  We in the west are actually deciding that the murder of innocent people is okay sometimes.

My heart is heavy, and I don't have words to describe what's going on in my head.  How does one argue the case for life?  Who would have thought we would have to?

Psalm 72

12 He will rescue the poor when they cry to him;
      he will help the oppressed, who have no one to defend them.
 13 He feels pity for the weak and the needy,
      and he will rescue them.
 14 He will redeem them from oppression and violence,
      for their lives are precious to him. 

Zephania 3

19 And I will deal severely with all who have oppressed you.
      I will save the weak and helpless ones;
   I will bring together
      those who were chased away.
   I will give glory and fame to my former exiles,
      wherever they have been mocked and shamed.
 20 On that day I will gather you together
      and bring you home again.
   I will give you a good name, a name of distinction,
      among all the nations of the earth,
   as I restore your fortunes before their very eyes.
      I, the Lord, have spoken!”