Both Sides Are Wrong
by Carol Kennedy of CarolsComments.com
Did I hear Rush Limbaugh say "Culture of Life"? I think I have even heard our local talk show hosts use the phrase. But I wonder if they really understand what it means. It would appear by the polls, the comments of folks on talk radio and news shows and by conversations with friends and relatives that very few people really understand the issue at stake in this battle between the cultures of Life and Death. I think people on both sides of the Terri Schiavo argument have really missed the whole point. Most discussion revolves around two issues: Michael Shiavo's motives and Terri Schiavo's potential for recovery.
Whether you think that Terri should be "allowed to die" because there is no hope of her recovery, or you think that Terri should be "allowed to live" because there is hope that she can talk or walk again, you are wrong. Yes Terri should be allowed to live. But not because she may recover from her severely brain damaged state (though that is certainly possible) and not because her husband may have less than pure motives, or because of his live in girlfriend and their children. Terri should be allowed to live because she is a human being created in the image and likeness of God.
Frankly, it doesn't matter whether she ever learns to speak again, or can ever swallow food on her own. It doesn't even matter if there is someone out there willing to take care of her. Even if her parents agreed with her husband that she would not want to live like this and should be "allowed to die" it would be wrong.
Terri's life has value outside of her cognitive abilities, outside of the desires of her friends and family, outside of the opinions of any judge, congressman or president, even outside her own opinions about her life. To refuse her that right to life by removing nutrition and hydration would be suicide or even murder.
Human life does not receive it's intrinsic value and goodness from perceived potential or functionality. A human being, beginning at the moment of her conception and continuing all the way through her natural death, has inestimable value because she is made in the image and likeness of God and created for her own sake. To measure the worth of a life based on the person's abilities, or even their enjoyment of life, is a slippery slope that we do not want to start sliding down. That slope leads to exterminating all brain damaged people, to abandoning severely handicapped infants, to euthanizing adults at the end of life because they cannot live on their own.
Each and every human being, no matter where on the spectrum of development, deserves the basic building blocks of life: food, shelter, love. To remove any of these in order to hasten death is to kill an innocent human being. When we, as a society, choose to kill those who have forfeited their right to life by their own heinous acts, we would never consider it humane to starve them or expose them to the elements. We choose what is considered humane–lethal injection or some other quick way of ending life. We never withhold basic nutrition and hydration–even from our disabled pets!
End of life decisions should be limited to the actual end of life. When disease or an accumulation of illnesses makes death imminent unless some heroic measures are taken (including those in which the functions of major organs like the heart and lungs are taken over by machines), it is sometimes humane to allow the person to die peacefully. But even in these cases nutrition and hydration would be given as much as is possible. And we would allow the person to be with their loved ones to enjoy as much of the last days of their life as possible.
Some people in this situation may be without any friends or family to care for them, but in a Culture of Life there will always be people to comfort them, to feed them, to sit by their side. Though it is not government's role to do this, it is the role of the government to encourage this to happen in every segment of society. And it is also government's role to protect those people who cannot speak for themselves, to make legislation when necessary that protects the disabled person no matter how disabled they might be.
In the case of Terri, we have a woman who is severely brain damaged, and has been for many years. Due to that damage, she cannot feed herself or swallow food. However her major organs are getting enough information from her brain to keep her alive. She can breathe, pump blood through her veins, and digest and metabolize food–she just can't get that food to her stomach for the process to take place. She needs help with this part of living. She, like many other people, lives with a tube in place to get food to her system. Even if her parents were not willing to take this on, it is the job of a just society, one that values life, to make sure that Terri gets food, water, and loving attention as long as she lives.
Whether or not Terri had a living will (in writing or in words to her husband), the removal of her feeding tube is clearly immoral. Terri is not dying of "a persistent vegetative state,"she is dying of neglect and starvation! It does not matter if you or I would want to live this way. Our feelings have nothing to do with it. Terri is a living human being and thus has value. Our society is in grave danger if we can stand by and let the courts take steps to kill an innocent woman simply because her brain is injured.
In 1997, Carol Kennedy received her MA in Theology with a certification in Catechetics from Franciscan University. She spent the next year teaching catechetical methods at the university. She then moved on to Ann Arbor, Michigan where she worked with the Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist as the DRE of the Spiritus Sanctus Academies. While in Ann Arbor she met her husband, Jim Kennedy, on the Ave Maria Catholic Singles website. Carol now lives in Northern California with her growing family.
