Sermon: The Ethics of the Terry Schiavo Case

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The Ethics of the Terry Schiavo Case

By Charles Rush

May 15, 2005

Below are notes for comments that were made to introduce a "talkback" session that was held in place of a formal sermon.

o issues: Who decides? When and How do we die?

Legal issue: Who decides?

The husband's contention- This was Terry's wish after having been to a couple funerals;

The testimony of friends

Legally, spouses have the right of surrogacy of proxy for these decisions; the substance of the legal case suggested that due process had been served.

The challenge of the parents- as Catholics the sanctity of life; they were willing to assume responsibility for her.

The legal test- the credibility of testimony vs. the actuality of writing down a living will…

Upshot: Put together a living will and review it annually. Legal issues, important in their own right, are not as interesting as the ethical issues.

Starve to Death:

Appears harsh.

The irony of the way we treat our relatives vs. the way that we treat Fido the pet; Humans we starve and would be horrified if we killed; Dogs we inject and would be horrified if we starved.

Medical testimony:

Persistent Vegetative State

15 years- at this point the prospect of recovery are so low as to become negligible barring a breakthrough in Medical

Qualification- Medical facts were questioned; didn't seem to me to be serious but perhaps a Doctor or Nurse familiar with the questions of diagnosis and prognosis would illumine us on factors that might come into play;

Medical testimony is important and does make a moral difference.

The Ethical Dilemma: We are victims of our own success.

Example of Nana: She had Dementia, stopped eating, for how long, who knows… Medical team asks my grandfather what they should do to treat his wife of 50 plus years. Started a feeding tube out of compassion and love. She never ate again and lived another several years without any substantive recognition of anyone else.

But for the previous 55,000 generations up til the last one, she would have just died of natural causes without any consideration.

The Evangelical Contribution:

Jesus died for each and every one of us; and in the resurrection we are all important regardless of our worth, socially, morally or medically; therefore, we should seek to extend, preserve, and sanctify life wherever we find it.

Consistency, clarity, simplicity.

Rests on solid tradition: Christians saving babies under the bridges of Rome

The position of the Orthodox in the 3 Major faiths

Orthodox Jewish argument:

God has given us food

Medicaments

Technology

All should be used to extend and preserve life

The fallacy with the argument lies in the transition from naturally occurring to technologically fabricated without a corresponding moral responsibility for discernment of use.

Food- natural occurring

Medicaments- some natural, some concocted, distilled, etc… all require the human ingenuity to figure out what works and what doesn't

Technology- all human fabrication

The Moral Confusion in this case:

Feeding tube looks like humanitarian compassion from a distance

Functions very much like technology

You can't do it for yourself

Others are just helping you;

Put it, it overrides your will

Islam-

Strong prohitbition against taking innocent life in the Koran

Distinction between living and not living

Bodily functions

Brain activity

Judaism-

Strong presumption to live

Recognizes that the process of 'Goses' at some point; the dying process has begun.

Once you establish that, then the moral onus is on those who extend the process of dying. The moral question is how you dignify and sanctify people as they die?

Cancer patients- terminal disorders;

The case of the Physician in England with stomach cancer: couldn't eat, threw up often; no prospect of living; restarted his heart 2 times; finally said, "Should this happen again, please don't do it again. Thank you."

Terminal cases- hold out for treatment that might develop reasonably in the next couple of years that could change the equation.

Persistent Vegetetive State-

Dimunition of our Higher Selves

Moral capacity, rational capacity, interpersonal capacity vs. Biological existence itself

Quality of Mercy and Compassion- prolonging suffering needlessly is not compassion. In the extreme case, we could say that they are being inflicted with life.

Cutting short life too soon is also morally problematic:

Conclusion: The unique factors in each case are what make it precisely morally engaging. Since we know the Schiavo case, comment on it…