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Mar. 27th, 2005 02:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
somedaybitchfor those of a Christian faith, today rates bigger than Christmas. sure, we celebrate Christmas as the day the Big Guy was born, but Easter is the day that after dying, He rises up and lives again. if you are so inclined to that belief.
having just buried my father -- and my deepest thanks and amazement for the Bishop of the Archdiosese that covers North Las Vegas for granting my family a special dispensation to have a mass on Holy Thursday-- i find myself thinking about the Schiavo case. there is no way that i would have allowed anyone, should my father's condition have degenerated to such a degree, to artifically sustain his life. and i speak from a position of experience, having already had to write a DNR order for my stepfather three years ago, when an outrageously aggressive cancer put him in a coma. (this week, oddly enough.) my definition of love precludes it. would i have wanted Larry to live? oh God, yes. but not like that. that wasn't life. that was existence. and they aren't the same thing. and for anyone that thinks otherwise, i tell you that you are self absorbed and stupid, and maybe you should try sitting at the bedside of a dying human and watch them waste away before your eyes.
my heart breaks for the family of Terri Schiavo. it truly does. and not because they have had to watch their loved one in such a state, but because some of them refuse to put aside their own grief and think about Terri. maybe not suprisingly, i fall on the side of the rule of law. the courts have exercised a diligence far beyond that required, and they have done so for years. the federal courts, and the federal government, have no right to intervene in a case that is clearly states rights. the former gets that, having twice refused to hear the case, the latter, sadly, does not. and i sort of understand why some of them truly believe that their actions are right, but this isn't about anyone's moral beliefs. it is about the rule of law. and it is about the rights that states have to determine what's best for their citizens without federal interference.
Terri has a right to live a good life, an actual life. her current existence is not that life. if those who claim they are basing this on their moral beliefs actually were doing so, then they would remember today, of all days, and its meaning, and they would let Terri go so that her soul could be free to continue.
there is an excellent faq on this case here.
so give it some thought, maybe from a different point of view, and then go find someone you love and hug them tight. and maybe don't let go for awhile because you are so lucky they are in your life.
having just buried my father -- and my deepest thanks and amazement for the Bishop of the Archdiosese that covers North Las Vegas for granting my family a special dispensation to have a mass on Holy Thursday-- i find myself thinking about the Schiavo case. there is no way that i would have allowed anyone, should my father's condition have degenerated to such a degree, to artifically sustain his life. and i speak from a position of experience, having already had to write a DNR order for my stepfather three years ago, when an outrageously aggressive cancer put him in a coma. (this week, oddly enough.) my definition of love precludes it. would i have wanted Larry to live? oh God, yes. but not like that. that wasn't life. that was existence. and they aren't the same thing. and for anyone that thinks otherwise, i tell you that you are self absorbed and stupid, and maybe you should try sitting at the bedside of a dying human and watch them waste away before your eyes.
my heart breaks for the family of Terri Schiavo. it truly does. and not because they have had to watch their loved one in such a state, but because some of them refuse to put aside their own grief and think about Terri. maybe not suprisingly, i fall on the side of the rule of law. the courts have exercised a diligence far beyond that required, and they have done so for years. the federal courts, and the federal government, have no right to intervene in a case that is clearly states rights. the former gets that, having twice refused to hear the case, the latter, sadly, does not. and i sort of understand why some of them truly believe that their actions are right, but this isn't about anyone's moral beliefs. it is about the rule of law. and it is about the rights that states have to determine what's best for their citizens without federal interference.
Terri has a right to live a good life, an actual life. her current existence is not that life. if those who claim they are basing this on their moral beliefs actually were doing so, then they would remember today, of all days, and its meaning, and they would let Terri go so that her soul could be free to continue.
there is an excellent faq on this case here.
so give it some thought, maybe from a different point of view, and then go find someone you love and hug them tight. and maybe don't let go for awhile because you are so lucky they are in your life.
