1

While I think the wrong prevailed in the Schiavo matter, I can't say I have so clear a sense of conviction about the merits of the case itself as you, or many others, do. Seems pretty sordid stuff from any angle, though.

You're quite right, though, that heterosexual marriage norms have drifted so far off the beam that there's little to no grounds for hoping that any amendment or other line in the sand is going to stop the erosion. It's going to take something other than that sort of politicking, entirely. (I don't take that to be a positive argument against the FMA or other approach, though.)

Here's the question we ought to consider, though: isn't part of this the fault of government for getting in the marriage business to begin with?

Think of it. The church "solemnizes" marriages, that is, both publicly recognizes and teaches concerning the fact and meaning of a new marriage. That ceremony has been mistakenly re-interpreted as *causing* the marriage, an innovation with no Biblical backing whatsoever. Now the government licenses marriages, too, for various legal purposes (such as determining whether benefits of marriage may be claimed).

It seems to me that reinstating "common-law" marriage would be a positive step. Also, churches ought to teach clearly that a marriage is not a ceremony or a transaction, but is what in fact exists where a man and a woman intend to have not two lives, but one.

If we're afraid to make such a libertarian move as getting government out of the business of regulating marriage, perhaps it's because we have a grossly inadequate theology of marriage.

Cheers,
PGE

2

Something that has confused me about the problem with hetrosexual marriage in the United States is the case of Polygamy.

Our culture seems to take it as normal relationship/sexual practice to engage in intercourse with as many partners as one chooses. It is so normal that even in family movies (Where no nudity is shown) those who are in dating relationships have sexual contact all the time. One is left with the impression that that is what two people who are dating do, have sex. Why wait?

And yet, polygamy is seen as something strange. Or worse, outright wrong.

A friend of mine who has absolutely no problem copulating with a new girl every week thinks it is horrific that a man would make a commitment to more than one woman.

I see this as a case of degree. Open sexual expression with anyone, anywhere, anytime does not appear to be morally superior to a committed relationship for life with multiple spouses.

I realize that i'm in the minority view in our society here but I cannot seem to grasp the concept of why. Why is our culture so ready and willing to accept intimate, sexual relationships amongst adults that do not commit to one another and rejects intimate, sexual relationships between adults who do commit to one another?

It puzzles me. Does it have something to do with the women's movement? Since men and women in our society are supposed to be equal then maybe that is why there is such a negative visceral reaction to Polygamy since such a relationship gives more power to the man? We can't have that.

3

Joe is such a hypocrite on this. If the law said that Michael would 'involuntarily divorce' Terri by sleeping with another woman then he would have spent the Terri debacle accusing Joe of trying to get his wife to die faster so he could start having sex again.

If Joe's version of the law were passed how many cases of 'quiet euthansia' would be caused by spouse guaradians motivated to off their incapacitated partners sooner rather than later?

Peronally I know of at least one case in real life where a person (a woman) wanted to remain married to a sick spouse but had an affair on the side. The impression I had was that the husband was somewhat aware of what was happening but choose to 'not want to know'. While I don't think that is a morally good thing to do I also wouldn't say the perfect should not become the enemy of the good. It's better that the wife stuck by her husband in an imperfect manner than that she abandon him entirely through divorce just when he was most vulnerable.

In fact, if a marriage license were found showing that Michael and Jodi had secretly married before Terri’s death, he would have been denied guardianship of his invalid wife.

Actually I would think the marriage to Jodi would be declared invalid. Michael would probably be charged with a crime but that wouldn't mean he would be divorced from Terri. In fact isn't the whole point of accusing him of bigamy predicated on a valid marriage to Terri? Doesn't Joe find it strange that he is trying to defend marriage by hawking what is essentially a version of 'common law divorce'? (Don't like your wife? Sleep with another woman and poof! You're divorced, no more responsibility to wife #1!)

4

Our culture seems to take it as normal relationship/sexual practice to engage in intercourse with as many partners as one chooses. It is so normal that even in family movies (Where no nudity is shown) those who are in dating relationships have sexual contact all the time. One is left with the impression that that is what two people who are dating do, have sex. Why wait?

And yet, polygamy is seen as something strange. Or worse, outright wrong.

As you should know, marriage is not primarily about sex. In fact, there are more than a few marriages that have become essentially sexless yet they continue as marriage.

Why does polygamy seem strange? The HBO series Big Love (which is growing on me even though I thought it was kind of boring initially) hits upon many of the reasons. Just after the last thread on polygamy closed up here I read a good article in the National Interest on it as well.

1. Naturally polygamous relationships are more complicated than two-person ones. With a two person couple there are two relationships (a to b and b to a). Just going to three people, though, adds complication expodentially. Not only is there the relationship between the man and each woman but also between each woman.

2. Mathematically it is impossible for polygamy not to be strange (meaning unusual). Imagine 1 out of 10 men take two wives. Then for the remaining 8 women there are 9 men. Since few people take themselves out of the marriage market entirely there's no way to get around there being a shortage unless you have a society with a really extreme gender imbalance. In many Muslim countries, polygamy may be legal but is just not done. Even in Saudi Arabia it is primarily reserved for the wealthy who can afford multiple wives.

3. Polygamy breeds social instability by creating a population of 'surplus males'. For the reason explained in #2 the poorest (and often youngest) males cannot easily get wives when the older (and more well off and attractive in some respects) males are gobbling up two or three at a time.

The social instability aspect can actually be studied by looking at countries like China. While they don't have polygamy they have a gender imbalance due to selective abortion (from parents seeking to have son's before daughters). You only need 5-10% of young males to be 'unmarriable' before you start seeing an increase in violence and other types of crime. Even in the US the few relatively small 'fundamentalist Mormon' communities that insist on polygamy generate literally hundreds of 'surplus males' who are often abandoned homeless in nearby cities when they are just young teenagers. ('Big Love' touches upon this when the lead confronts his father for doing just that to him when he was only 14, the father says simply that this is the way of the world).

5

It puzzles me. Does it have something to do with the women's movement? Since men and women in our society are supposed to be equal then maybe that is why there is such a negative visceral reaction to Polygamy since such a relationship gives more power to the man? We can't have that.

Ironically this is false, polygamy gives more power to women and in a society where women and men are equals it would give them even more potent power. Economically it's pretty easy to see why. Take Donald Trump, with monogamy the women married to him gets 100% of his income (minus, of course, what he and his lawyers keep for him). Good for her but all the other women have to deal with what's left in the market after Trump is taken out. With polygamy two, three, or more women can split his fortune.

Good for them but also good for the women who don't marry Trump. When they seek husbands they not only can look to unmarried men but also to married men. In other words, your girlfriend can not only dump you for your roommate, she could also dump you for your father! Men can address this in polygamous cultures by pushing the marriage age down for women (which obviously means more vulnerable girls can be victimized) but that only goes so far.

6

Boonton, I'm not sure which way you're going with these points.

Anyway, both you and (Eric or Lisa) seem to be assuming that "polygamy" means what the dictionary definition says; but surely the issue in our society would never be parsed that way. We would have "polygamy" and "polyandry" both.

Nonetheless, I'm prone to suspect that many of the imbalances you've mentioned for polygamy would appertain, anyway. The social construction of gender only has so much flexibility, no matter how we economize it; there do seem to be some hard boundaries which any society hits, sooner or later.

I agree that some of Joe's arguments would be much the same, either way, but then--wouldn't he be correct to object to the opportunistic interpretation of the laws over against one's moral commitments, in either case? You object to Joe's apparent opportunism in making his argument this way (there may be some justice there), but surely he is not wrong to notice the same in the life-or-death scenario he's considering?

Take care,
PGE

7

Joe Carter will never accept the fact that Michael Schiavo had to deal with a brain dead woman, and by equating the brain dead to the non-brain dead, he devalues human life.

8

I know this is a little off the point... but

is anyone else interested about how the leaders found out that these guy was talking in his sleep?

I think the wife may have wanted this to happen?

9

Anyway, both you and (Eric or Lisa) seem to be assuming that "polygamy" means what the dictionary definition says; but surely the issue in our society would never be parsed that way. We would have "polygamy" and "polyandry" both.

Indeed, in our society where gender equality is highly valued it would be almost impossible to think traditional polygamy (where a man can marry multiple wives but women can only marry one man) would ever be implemented.

The social instability under polygamy is pretty much a given. There is no way to predict, however, what would happen if both genders had the opportunity to marry multiple partners. It's possible that there would be just as many women collecting two or three husbands as men collecting two to three wives that the imbalances would cancel each other out. Since there are very few precedents I'd say this would all be highly speculative.

Boonton, I'm not sure which way you're going with these points.

Just addressing Eric & Lisa's concern. Their argument seems to be that if there's no obvious argument against polygamy why should Michael be attacked for practicing what seems to be a form of it.

I agree that some of Joe's arguments would be much the same, either way, but then--wouldn't he be correct to object to the opportunistic interpretation of the laws over against one's moral commitments, in either case? You object to Joe's apparent opportunism in making his argument this way (there may be some justice there), but surely he is not wrong to notice the same in the life-or-death scenario he's considering?

If the law said that a spouse created a de facto divorce by cheating on an incapacitated partner we'd open the door to many serious problems:

1. Michael would probably have held back having the affair. This would have lead to charges he was trying to hasten his wife's death so he could start seeing other women. (In other words, we see once again the pro-lifers have constructed a 'heads I win, tails you loose' argument with Michael. They simply will not accept even the possibility that Michael may have sincerely felt that this was the best decision for his wife...even if he was mistaken or wrong. In their eyes Michael will always have nefarious, dishonest motives). Whatever the morality of his 'bigamy' the fact is it reduced any alleged conflict-of-interest charge. He obviously could have choosen to support having Terri on life support for the rest of her life AND be with a healthy woman and have a family with her.

2. Such a law would be unfair and unjust to the many people who would not want a 'de facto' divorce in such a situation. How many times, in such cases, would guardianship pass onto children or other family members that the sick person may not feel are the best judges of their desires when they cannot speak for themselves? There are probably quite a few people who would want decision making power to stay with their spouses even if they had an affair during a horribly difficult scenero such as a hopeless coma. Who is Joe or the gov't to decide for such people that they would choose divorce rather than forgiveness in such situations?

3. Since Bush won there's been a continuing debasement of the intellectual credibility of many conservatives. Perhaps nothing indicates this more than trying to jerry-rig the outcome of a difficult case by inventing ad hoc rules on the fly. No sane conservative would ever propose such a dangerous idea as the 'screw the baby sitter and get yourself an automatic 'common law divorce' from that annoying woman you married' that was proposed here. Yet people will clap for this idea because it just happens to produce an outcome that they desire (haha Michael, you aren't her guardian anymore 'cause you really divorced her and married another woman without realizing it!).

I know this is a little off the point... but

is anyone else interested about how the leaders found out that these guy was talking in his sleep?

I think the wife may have wanted this to happen?

In a similar vein didn't Brittany Spears 'accidently' marry someone after a drunk night in Vegas?

10

Joe is such a hypocrite on this. If the law said that Michael would 'involuntarily divorce' Terri by sleeping with another woman then he would have spent the Terri debacle accusing Joe of trying to get his wife to die faster so he could start having sex again.

Do you even bother reading what you write? Michael Shiavo didn’t just “sleep with another woman.” He moved in with a woman and had two children with her. We’re not talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so he could start having sex again; we’re talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so that he could make his new “marriage” legitimate.

If Joe's version of the law were passed how many cases of 'quiet euthansia' would be caused by spouse guaradians motivated to off their incapacitated partners sooner rather than later?

You are aware that Terri Schiavo died aren’t you? The “quiet euthanasia” scenario you present is not some hypothetical that could occur with a change in the law but a reality that occurred because of the current loophole in the system.

Doesn't Joe find it strange that he is trying to defend marriage by hawking what is essentially a version of 'common law divorce'? (Don't like your wife? Sleep with another woman and poof! You're divorced, no more responsibility to wife #1!)

Really, Boonton, you should actually read my posts before you bother commenting. There is nothing in my post that says that sleeping with another women is enough to warrant a “common law divorce.” But when a man cohabitates for over half a decade and has two children with another woman then it seems hard to believe that the first marriage has not been irretrievably broken.

11

On Terri Schiavo - I seem to remember an interview with her parents where her mother admitted that Terri had stated that she did not want to live "like that" when she saw an aunt that was on life-support. Terri's mom responded with something like, "But she didn't mean it".

So, even her parents admitted that Terri had verbally transmitted the desire to "not live like that".

I have a medical power of attorny written up and my parents are not in it - just because of that.

When I told my parents whose name was on the paper, my mom didn't like it. The conversation went something like:
Mom: but we're your parents.
Me : I know and I don't want you to have to make that choice.
Mom: But look what's happening with Terri.
Me: I know. Mom, what choice would you have made if you were Terris' mom?
Mom: Just what her parents are doing.
Me: Mom, would you want to live like that?
Mom: No.
Me: Then why would you want to make me?
Mom: Because I'm your mother.
Me: Which is why I don't want you making that choice for me.

12

Do you even bother reading what you write? Michael Shiavo didn’t just “sleep with another woman.” He moved in with a woman and had two children with her. We’re not talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so he could start having sex again; we’re talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so that he could make his new “marriage” legitimate.

So it's ok to sleep with the woman but not have kids with her? Also if a person is stuck up on legitimacy then by definition illegitimate means conceiving kids before marriage. The kids would technically be 'bastards' even if the parents married after the fact. Do you have any actual evidence that this was an important motive for Michael or are you just making stuff up on the fly?

You are aware that Terri Schiavo died aren’t you? The “quiet euthanasia” scenario you present is not some hypothetical that could occur with a change in the law but a reality that occurred because of the current loophole in the system.

Yes I am aware that Schiavo is no longer alive. Are you aware that when you propose rule changes that they apply to, like, everyone? Not just the particular case you want decided in a certain way? If this is the policy how many spouses might be inclined to color their medical decisions for incapacitated spouses in such a way as to hasten their deaths out of the desire to be able to have such affairs without the state legally coming in and destroying their marriage rights?

A long time ago you talked about administering morphine to your mother who was dying of cancer. You said, if I recall, at some points you were tempted to up the dosage to lessen her suffering. No one would have ever detected such a thing nor would you have been prosecuted even if they did. How many such little decisions does a guardian have? Your proposal basically is putting a powerful incentive for guardians to lean towards shortening the life of their wards when they have the opportunity to make such decisions. By 'quiet euthanasia' I'm not talking about full blown, formal Dutch style 'mercy killing' complete with forms and red tape to fill out.

Really, Boonton, you should actually read my posts before you bother commenting. There is nothing in my post that says that sleeping with another women is enough to warrant a “common law divorce.” But when a man cohabitates for over half a decade and has two children with another woman then it seems hard to believe that the first marriage has not been irretrievably broken.

My father-in-law's father (fiance's grandfather) spent his life as a womanizer. He hardly ever lived with his wife except for very brief periods. While he didn't father children with other women he certainly did everything he could to 'irretrievably break' his marriage. On her deathbed, though, her words to him were "I always loved you and I forgive you". My father-in-law told me that after that he was never quite the same.

Now shouldn't the choice be with the person inside the marriage to decide if the marriage is 'irretrievably broken'? There are more than a few cases where spouses choose to tolerate or even consent to such affairs where they are incapacitated due to illness. This may not be right but it seems to me a gross invasion of privacy and quite frankly the sanctity of marriage to advocate that the state should 'know better' and step in to make such decisions on behalf of people it cannot possibly know enough to make such important decisions for.

13

Oh please not this nonsense again. Terri Schiavo suffered a corronary incident which caused irreversible brain damage. When they finaly let her die,the autopsy confirmed what virtually every REAL doctors who had examined her said...namely that she was little more than a breathing CORPSE well beyond any possibility of recovery. And the monney that they received from the malpractice suit was depleted caring for her. The only opportunism in this case was on the part of the evengelical wacko baskets who latched onto this case like parasitic leeches to further their own political aims.

14

A side note:

While he was still married to Terri, Michael cohabitated with Jodi Centonze, a woman with whom he shares two children. He later married Centonze in January 2006. Under Florida state law, if Michael had attempted to marry Jodi while Terri was s still living, his action would be considered “illegal, bigamous, and void from its inception.” In fact, if a marriage license were found showing that Michael and Jodi had secretly married before Terri’s death, he would have been denied guardianship of his invalid wife. Yet because Florida repealed common law marriage laws in 1968, Michael Schiavo was able to live like a bigamist without having to suffer the legal consequences.

The repeal of common law marriage had nothing to do with this situation. Common law marriage is secondary to legal marriage. It is designed for two unmarried people to be considered married simply because they choose to live together as married people. States that have common law marriage still on the books have various standards, for example some might have a time period while others might require some affirmative action such as the couple referring to themselves as Mr and Mrs.

What is clear, though, is that common law marriage does not trump formal, legal marriage. If a person is married to someone else simply cohabitating with another woman does not create a second marriage in any way nor does it dissolve the original marriage. Michael could not be charged with bigamy even if he lived in a common law state. Likewise if Michael decided to leave Jodi Centonze before they married in Jan '06 she would not have any recourse to claim alimony or other entitlements from him that she would have as a wife (except child support, though, which is not based on his cohabitating with her but from the fact that he is the father).

15

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_law_marriage#United_States reviews Common Law marriages for the states that still have them. While the requirements differ most have as their first requirement 'capacity'...two people who legally could get married. So even in a common law state a married person living with another woman is just that, not an 'attempted bigamist'.

16

Joe Carter:

When a woman flat-lines her EEG for 5 years, it's only a question of what to do with the corpse.

17

I always find it intriguing how social conservatives and other enemies of Michael Schiavo conveniently neglect to mention that he started over with a new woman at the behest of the Schindlers, and with their blessing. As early as 1991, they were actively pressuring him to "get on with his life" and start dating again, effectively conceding that Terri wasn't going to get better. Odd how nobody ever condemns them for their enabling role in the "bigamy."

But I can completely understand why the Terry Schiavo fiasco so stings the evangelical crowd: it's the one area where they've been unequivocally proven to be far outside the mainstream, holding positions that a large majority of Americans from all across the political spectrum oppose.

It also strikes me odd that Joe uses an example of a marriage being too-trivially nullified to make his point that it should have been possible/easier for someone to nullify the Schiavos' marriage.

18

I hope my wife would have the courage and consideration to act on my behalf as Mr. Schiavo did if I were in the state Mrs. Schiavo was. It disgusts me that some people would try to strip her of that power. My wife, incidentally, feels the same way. This mutual attitude regarding the prolonging of life, coupled with our wariness of increasingly powerful pro-life forces, has led us to compose and sign a living will. I recommend others do so as well to preserve some power regarding end-of-life situations in an increasingly hostile legal environment.

19

Joe:
We’re not talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so he could start having sex again; we’re talking about a guy who wanted to speed up his wife’s death so that he could make his new “marriage” legitimate.

That's an interesting take on his motives. Had that been his primary motivation, he could have simply divorced her and moved on. In fact, that's what some social conservatives were arguing he ought to do.

20

It's this sort of demonization of Michael Schiavo that reverses the many positive contributions of this blog.

If Michael Schiavo had been the parent, rather than the husband, of Terri, his opportunism would have been widely condemned.

Opportunism? Most people have the highest respect for him, the way he stayed by her side, cared for her, in spite of being hounded by protesters, receiving death threats and being offered millions of dollars to step aside.

Michael admits that he was considering changing his mind and letting her live until his lawyer reminded him “it wasn't just about Terri anymore."

That's selective quoting. The next sentence:

"It was about the rest of the people who didn't want the government telling us how we could die and when we were allowed to decide that we didn't want further medical treatment."

21

Terri Schiavo's Final Hours

An Eyewitness Account

Fr. Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life
President, National Pro-life Religious Council

You may have seen on the news that I was at Terri Schiavo's bedside during the last 14 hours of her earthly life, right up until five minutes before her death. During that time with Terri, joined by her brother and sister, I expressed your care, concern, and prayers. I told Terri over and over that she had many friends around the country, many people who were praying for her and were on her side. I had also told her the same things during my visits to her in the months before her feeding tube was removed, and am convinced she understood.

I've known Terri's family for about six years now and they put me on the visitor's list. Terri was in a hospice but there were police officers stationed outside her room. If I were not on that visitor's list I could not get in that room beyond the armed guard because the visitor's list was kept very, very small and very well controlled. The reason? The euthanasia advocates had to be able to say that Terri was an unresponsive person in some kind of vegetative state, coma or whatever terminology they want to use to suggest that she was completely unresponsive. The only way to prove she was responsive was to see her for yourself.

I went down to see her in September 2004 and again in February 2005.

When her mom first introduced her to me, she stared at me intently. She focused her eyes. She would focus her eyes on whoever was talking to her. If somebody spoke to her from the other part of the room she would turn her head and her eyes towards the person who was talking to her.

You know what some of the doctors have dared to say about this? "Oh, it's just reflex reactions. Unconscious reflex reactions." Interestingly, that's exactly the same thing they say about the unborn child when you look at the video The Silent Scream when the child opens his mouth and tries to move away from the instrument that is about to destroy him. They say, "Oh, that's just an automatic reflex." That's the phrase they always use to dehumanize the person.

I told Terri she has many people around the country and around the world who lover her and are praying for her. She looked at me attentively. I said, "Terri now we are going to pray together, I want to give you a blessing, let's say some prayers." So I laid my hand on her head. She closed her eyes. I said the prayer. She opened her eyes again at the end of the prayer. Her dad leaned over to her and said, "OK Terri now here comes the tickle," because he has a mustache. She would laugh and smile and after he kissed her I saw her return the kiss. Her mom asked her a question at a certain point and I heard her voice. She was trying to respond. She was making sounds in response to her mother's question, not just at odd times and meaningless moments. I heard her trying to say something but she was not, because of her disability, able to articulate the words. So she was responsive.

Now, the night before she died I was in the room for probably a total of 3-4 hours, and then for another hour the next morning -- her final hour.

Brothers and sisters to describe the way she looked as peaceful is a total distortion of what I saw. Here now was a person, who for thirteen days had no food or water. She was, as you would expect, very drawn in her appearance as opposed to when I had seen her before. Her eyes were open but they were going from one side to the next, constantly oscillating back and forth, back and forth. The look on her face (I was staring at her for three and a half-hours) I can only describe as a combination of fear and sadness … a combination of dreaded fear and sadness.

Her mouth was open the whole time. It looked like it was frozen open. She was panting rapidly. It wasn't peaceful in any sense of the word. She was panting as if she had just run a hundred miles. But a shallow panting. Her brother Bobby was sitting opposite me. He was on one side of the bed I was on the other facing him. Terri's head in between us and her sister Suzanne was on my left. We sat there and we had a very intense time of prayer. And we were talking to Terri, urging her to entrust herself completely to the Savior. I assured her repeatedly of the love and prayers and concern of so many people.

We held her hand and stroked her head. During those hours, one of the things I did was to chant, in Latin, some of the most ancient hymns of the Church. One of the chants I used was the "Victimae Paschali Laudis," which is the ancient proclamation of the resurrection of Christ. There, as I saw before my eyes the deadly work of the Culture of Death, I proclaimed the victory of life. "Life and death were locked in a wondrous struggle," the hymn declares. "Life's Captain died, but now lives and reigns forevermore!"

And then we had just times of silence … just sitting there in silence trying to absorb what was happening.

But besides Bobby and his sister and Terri herself, you know who else was in the room with us? A police officer. The whole time. At least one. Sometimes two. Sometimes three armed police officers in the room. You know why they were in the room? They wanted to make sure that we didn't do anything that we weren't supposed to do, like give her communion or maybe a glass of water. In fact, Bobby, sitting on the other side of the bed, would occasionally stand up to lean over his sister. When he stood up and did that, the officer would change position. He would move around towards the foot of the bed so that he could have a direct line of sight on what we were doing. The morning that she died we went in there fairly early and I had to go back outside in front of the hospice to do an interview. In order to go out on time I had a little timepiece in my hand and at the beginning of our visit I put it in my left hand, leaned over Terri and extended my right to bless her and we began praying. I closed my eyes and I felt a tap on my left hand. It was the police officer who said, "Father, what do you have in your hand?" I said, "Oh, officer, it's a little time piece." "I'll have to hold it while you're here," he said. We couldn't have anything in our hands. He didn't even know what it was. Maybe I was going to try to give her communion. Maybe I was going to try to moisten her lips. Who knows what terrible thing I was about to do?

You know what the most ironic thing was? There was a little night table in the room. I could put my hand on the table and on Terri's head all within arms reach. You know what was on that table? A vase of flowers filled with water. And I looked at the flowers. They were beautiful. There were roses their and other types of flowers and there was another one on the other side of the room at the foot of the bed. Two beautiful bouquets of flowers filled with water. Fully nourished, living, beautiful. And I said to myself, this is absurd. This is absurd. These flowers are being treated better than this woman. She has not had a drop of water for almost two weeks. Why are those flowers there? What type of hypocrisy is this? The flowers were watered. Terri wasn't. The other irony is - had I dipped my hand in that water and put it on her tongue - the officer would have led me out probably under arrest. He would have certainly led me out of the room. Something is wrong here.

As you may have also seen, those who killed Terri were quite angry that I said so. The night before she died, I said to the media that her estranged husband Michael, his attorney Mr. Felos, and Judge Greer were murderers. I also pointed out, that night and the next morning, that contrary to Felos' description, Terri's death was not at all peaceful and beautiful. It was, on the contrary, quite horrifying. In my 16 years as a priest, I never saw anything like it before.

After I said these things, Mr. Felos and others in sympathy with him began attacking me in the press and before the cameras. Some news outlets began making a story out of their attacks and said I was "fanning the flames" of enmity and hatred.

Actually, there's a simple reason why they are so angry with me. They had hoped that they could present Terri's death as a merciful and gentle act. My words took the veil of euphemism away, calling this a killing, and giving eyewitness testimony to the fact that it was anything but gentle. Mr. Felos is a euthanasia advocate, and like all such advocates, he needs to manipulate the language, to sell death in an attractive package. Here he and his friends had a great opportunity to do so. But a priest, seeing their work close-up and then telling the world about it, just didn't fit into their plans.

One of the attacks they made was that a "spiritual person" like a priest should be speaking words of compassion and understanding, instead of venom. But compassion demands truth. A priest is also a prophet, and if he cannot cry out against evil, then he cannot bring about reconciliation. If there is going to be any healing between these families or in this nation, it must start with repentance on the part of those who murdered Terri and now try to cover it up with flowery language.

Another aspect of the Terri Schiavo tragedy is that many people misunderstand its cause and therefore its solution. They think the problem was that Terri did not leave any written instructions about whether she wanted to be kept alive. In order to avoid any such problem in their own lives, they are now told that they have to draw up a "living will." This is both erroneous and dangerous.

Terri's case is not about the withdrawal of life-saving medical treatment, but rather about the killing of a healthy person whose life some regarded as worthless. Terri was not dying, was not on life support, and did not have any terminal illness. Because some thought she would not want to live with her disability, they insisted on introducing the cause of death, namely, dehydration.

So what good is a living will supposed to accomplish, aside from saying, "Please don't argue about killing me, just kill me?"

The danger in our culture is not that we will be over-treated, but rather that we will be under-treated. We already have the right to refuse medical treatment. What we run the risk of losing is the right to receive the most basic humane care — like food and water — in the event we have a disability.

Our culture also promotes the idea that as long as we say we want to die, we have the right to do so. But we have a basic obligation to preserve our own life. A person who leaves clear instructions that they don’t want to be fed is breaking the moral law by requesting suicide.

If you want to make plans for your future health care, do not do so by trying to predict the future. The reason you cannot indicate today what medical treatments you do or don't want tomorrow is that you don't know what medical condition you will have tomorrow, nor what treatments will be available to give you the help you need. Living wills try to predict the future, and people can argue over the interpretation of a piece of paper just as much as they argue about what they claim someone said in private.

The better solution is to appoint a health care proxy, who is authorized to speak for you if you are in a condition in which you cannot speak for yourself. This should be a person who knows your beliefs and values, and with whom you discuss these matters in detail. In case you cannot speak for yourself, your proxy can ask all the necessary questions of your doctors and clergy, and make an assessment when all the details of your condition and medical needs are actually known. That's much safer than predicting the future. Appointing a health care proxy in a way that safeguards your right to life is easy. In fact, the National Right to Life Committee has designed a "Will to Live," which can be found at www.nrlc.org and which I recommend highly.

I am in regular contact with Terri's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, and her siblings, Bobby and Suzanne. They are strong Christians with a beautiful, gentle spirit. If you wish to relay a personal message to them, you can send it to terri@priestsforlife.org and I will pass it along to them myself.

Meanwhile, let us continue to commend Terri to the Lord, mindful of the equal value of every life, no matter how prominent or obscure, healthy or sick.

22

I told Terri over and over that she had many friends around the country, many people who were praying for her and were on her side. I had also told her the same things during my visits to her in the months before her feeding tube was removed, and am convinced she understood.

I am glad that made you feel good, Father Frank. Now for some reality: Terry didn't understand you because she was brain dead. And praying for people who don't know you are praying for them does not help them.

It's 2006, Father Frank. You know what year it is, Father Frank, because you clearly know how the media works.

Pilate might have thought that Jesus used sick people as pawns in political games. But he wouldn't have had any doubts about his present day followers.

Shame.

23

Meanwhile, let us continue to commend Terri to the Lord, mindful of the equal value of every life, no matter how prominent or obscure, healthy or sick.

Empty words, as every honest Christian knows.

But keep repeating them. It's better than thinking, right?

24

Actually, there's a simple reason why they are so angry with me. They had hoped that they could present Terri's death as a merciful and gentle act.

Death is rarely gentle and peaceful but it is a reality. Terri died because she had a massive brain injury that made her unable to drink. Advocates of peaceful and gentle deaths would not support simply not giving Terri the life support of the feeding tube but actual euthansia...administering to her drugs that would end her life quickly and peacefully.

Terri's case is not about the withdrawal of life-saving medical treatment, but rather about the killing of a healthy person whose life some regarded as worthless. Terri was not dying, was not on life support, and did not have any terminal illness. Because some thought she would not want to live with her disability, they insisted on introducing the cause of death, namely, dehydration.

1. Terri was not healthy.

2. Terri was on life support.

3. If Terri could drink without life support she could not legally be denied fluids.

The better solution is to appoint a health care proxy, who is authorized to speak for you if you are in a condition in which you cannot speak for yourself. This should be a person who knows your beliefs and values, and with whom you discuss these matters in detail

That would be your spouse. If you feel your spouse will not be a good proxy then leave written instructions. But, to return this thread to its original point, the gov't nor Joe Carter nor 'Priests for Life' have the right to presume to speak for Terri as to whether or not she wanted her husband to be her 'health care proxy'. We only know that Terri choose to marry and remain married to Michael before she lost the ability to communicate for herself. We have no right to presume that we could override that decision of hers nor is it reasonable to assume that her parents were any better at speaking for her interest. I don't think I need to point out Jesus's description of marriage here.

It's interesting that so-called defenders of marriage would trivialize it and infantalize its participants here just to get a verdict that they want for one particular case (a verdict that was rendered long ago and would be moot now).

25

All:

I note the ongoing debate over Mrs Terri Schindler-Schaivo, on the anniversary of her court-ordered starvation and dehydration to death.

Having seen the vicious and sustained personal attacks on both TM and myself-- never apologised for, B: for shame!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! -- in the previous thread where this came up, I simply provide a link for those who wish to see where the obvious duty to a helpless human being was short-circuited. Go to the Oct 13 2005 Dung Eaters thread, and look from about Oct 22 on. If you want information and linke, they are all there, over the next month or so.

Put it this way, the most telling point of all was that easily done tests which would have established the alleged brain dead state beyond reasonable doubt, were never done. They were not done, not because they could not have been done, but bevcause someone was playing power games with the courts over right to life.

It is time to wake up and smell the coffee -- or is it the stench of moral decay?

+++++++++

Grace, open our eyes

Gordon

PS to B: a return to the sick, vicious ad hominem tactics in the linked thread will simply expose you as utterly uncivil. Kindly refrain from so exposing yourself inthe new climate in this blog.

26

PS to B: a return to the sick, vicious ad hominem tactics in the linked thread will simply expose you as utterly uncivil. Kindly refrain from so exposing yourself inthe new climate in this blog.

I'm not even sure Gordon even reads my posts anymore.

27

An autposy proved that Terri Shiavo was brain dead and had been for years, and yet there are people still decrying that her body was allowed to expire, according to her wishes? Good grief.

28

I always find it intriguing how social conservatives and other enemies of Michael Schiavo conveniently neglect to mention that he started over with a new woman at the behest of the Schindlers, and with their blessing.

Mr. Girsch, I don't have the evidence in front of me but remember mention that the Schindlers thought that if Michael "moved on" with his life, then they could receive guardianship of Terri.

Also, I for one am not an "enemy" of Michael Schiavo.

But I can completely understand why the Terry Schiavo fiasco so stings the evangelical crowd: it's the one area where they've been unequivocally proven to be far outside the mainstream, holding positions that a large majority of Americans from all across the political spectrum oppose.

This argument used by you and others indicates argumentum ad populum thinking as well as "argument from incredulity." The popularity of a position is not an indicator of its moral rightness or wrongness, nor does it have anything to do with the reason that I and other evangelicals take issue with the way Terri Schiavo's case was handled.

29

Bonnie,

You are correct that the popularity of a position does not demonstrate its rightness or wrongness. I would, however, change the passage you were responding to to read:

it's the one area where they've been unequivocally proven to be false

Many of the loudest and most vocal on the 'pro-Terri' side of the issue were caught red handed making false accusations, making accusations that they could not possibly know to be true or false, deploying double standards (expert opinions don't matter, unless they agree with me in that case they are truely expert) and so on.

Just look at the continued bashing of Michael on this list. The snide implications that his only motivation was money, or sex, or a desire to 'off' a wife standing in his way of a new wife and so on. Did the prohibition against bearing false witness get repealed in some new translation of the Bible that I didn't hear about?

I don't presume Michael's motives were pure. I do recognize that I have no right to question either his motives or her parents without good proof. For example, what did not get reported very much was that Michael initially got along with her parents. He even lived with them as he studied nursing so he could take care of her himself. When the malpractice judgement was settled a huge fight broke out between them and one of the issues was that they had given him free room and board for a few years while he was fighting the case and studying.

Now I could selectively deploy facts like that and build up a snide depiction of greedy parents who are acting out of their own nefarious motives. But that would be wrong because I don't really know her parents. I assume that they honestly believed they had Terri's best interest at heart. That doesn't mean I believe their opinion was infallible or correct but I try to be careful questioning motives when I'm aware of my ignorance.

The pro-Terri's parents side here , though, seemed to feel no inhibitions there. In fact, their whole argument reeked of a basic lack of respect for anyone who disagreed with them. This is why they lost the mainstream and the mainstream was right to recoil. You need only look at the 'motive issue' to see how many on your side seemed to take us all for fools:

Q: Why does Michael feel as he does?

A: So he can get the money!

Q: But he won his own money, and now its nearly all gone.

A: Gone on laywer fees trying to kill his wife!

Q: But now there's no money and the parent's side offered him million(s) to step away? Why is he fighting?

A: To off his wife so he can be single.

Q: But he is already hooked up with a woman?

A: He wants to have legitimate children with them.

Q: But the children he already had with her are illegitimate.

A: OK, he really attacked her and wants to kill her incase she wakes up and testifies against him.

and so on....

Come to think of it, the right here sounded a lot like Michael Moore did in F. 9/11. Spinning a bunch of convoluted theories about Bush's motives, not even caring that the supporting evidence didn't stand up to even slight scrutiny...not only that, the theories were not even internally consistent.

The reality, IMO, this issue for the right was like Moore's 9/11. A piece of intellectual masturbation that felt good but made you oblivious that everyone else around you was disgusted.

30

Boonton, I'm not saying that there wasn't slander and disrespect (or worse) on both sides. But such charges apply to both sides. I simply wanted to point out that not all who were wanting Terri to be protected can be put in a box as to motivation.

My sense is that both the Schindlers and Michael Schiavo responded to push-comes-to-shove. This is not such an unusual occurrance; it's just that their particular incidents became highly public.

My memory isn't great but I think that Mr. Schindler felt betrayed when Michael didn't give him the share of the settlement that he'd promised him, which is understandable.

I also think that Michael did a lot of what he did to protect his own honor, not necessarily Terri's. But I have only indirect proof of this.

31

My memory isn't great but I think that Mr. Schindler felt betrayed when Michael didn't give him the share of the settlement that he'd promised him, which is understandable.

There is something distasteful about this idea of a Mr. Schindler getting angry about not getting his 'share' or 'cut' of a malpractice award on his daughter's behalf. But this would hardly be the first time that money made family members bitter enemies.

I speculate that the two got along relatively well until that fight over money. After that the two drew to dramatically different camps. All in the sudden every decision made by one was automatically viewed as wrong and evil in the eyes of the other.

That would explain, for example, how members of her family suddenly 'remembered' that there was reason to think Michael was abusive against Terri before her injury and might have even caused it himself. Yet back when he was living with them and they were all on the same page & suing the doctors they didn't seem to have any reason at all to suspect him.

What probably happened with them as a family is sad but hardly unusual. Family fueds are always the most vicious types of fueds.