Very discouraged tonight....

[carlos123]

...My question is if they are starving Terri to death why don't they give her something to help her pass quicker?  Starving her to death seems very cruel to me.  Is she in pain and can she feel the starvation?

The more appropriate question is whether there is the possibility that she is conscious enough in her disabled state to feel pain and starvation. From all the reading I have done the answer to that is a most resounding YES!

A dianosis of being in a PVS (Persistent Vegetative State) was judged to be the case by Judge Greer based on 3 out of 5 doctors saying so. Since when does a judgment regarding a diagnosis being used in part to justify her death come down to a matter of majority opinion?

There is ample evidence to believe that she does indeed feel pain. There is simply too much for me to go into it all (and I don't have the time just now to post links to it). Go to BlogsforTerri and the Empire Journal and read, read, read.

Don't beleive everything being reported in the mainstream media!!! You are not getting an accurate picture of what is happening.

The media for the most part, portrays it all as a loving husband wanting to let his wife die peacefully in a merciful sort of way out of respect for her wishes that she would not want to live the way she is living. The truth is far different from this!

Read, read, read. Stay informed. Go to blogs and Internet sites that give up to the minute information from Christians or other people of good moral character about what is happening.

Take everything being said through the mainstream media with a great big grain of salt.

Carlos

[Constant]

...My question is if they are starving Terri to death why don't they give her something to help her pass quicker?

[carlos123]

Usually do!

Sorry if I came accross too stongly in my response Constant. It's hard for me to talk about this issue.

I feel utterly overwhelmed in my heart over what is happening and frustrated by my lack of ability to get out what I am feeling. I suppose one could rightly say that there is a burden on my heart that words alone cannot alleviate.

I have read so much on this issue and am greatly concerned to realize through such reading what is happening to our country. That the last bastions of decency and good sense are coming down. That the stage is being set for the kind of tyranny that the Founding Fathers tried to protect us from. The lights are dimming and the show begins that will conclude in the destruction of most all that our Founding Fathers considered precious and worth risking life and limb to bring into existance.

If Christians do not wake up from their slumber and become active we will loose it all.

I surely hope and pray that my concerns are overblown. Perhaps I am becoming too agitated over all this. Though the evidence of what is happening does not support such a hope.

Carlos

[ted]

Carlos, this is very frustrating for all of us.

There are many issue still yet to be fully explored in this situation, all of which directly affect the outcome.

Some of these are:

1) We don't put criminals to death with out properly exploring all possibilities of innocence. Why would it be different here? So far as I can tell, her "wishes" not to live like this came from one man, revealed seven years after she fell into this state. SEVEN years! Truly amazing! Suddenly, it's a big issue. And all of this from a man that has abandoned his marriage vows and has moved on.

I ask, what interest does he hold in the matter anymore? Does he even have the rights anymore to make such a decision?

2) Many issues are yet to be determined, shouldn't we wait unti they are exhausted before the tube is removed? Some say that the husband has denied her specialized care that could help her. A doctor has said there is a possibility that she has been misdiagnosed. Nurses say she has shown signs of coherency other than what has been attributed to her. Shouldn't we err on the side of life until every fact is explored?

It's going to be a rough time if things come out after she dies.

3)If, in fact, all facts point to a truth the she did, in fact, want to be put to death if she ever became incapacitated like this, is starvation really the best way?

Death row inmates are given lethal injections to make the transition from life to death. Shouldn't we extend the same courtesy to an innocent person?

We wouldn't do this to animals! And if we did, we'd end up jail!

Truly twisted and backwards.

We see on the news how hundreds will come to the aid of beached whales, abused animals, and rain forests, but little is done here.

BTW- just where is the ACLU to protect terri's civil rights?

Truly, this is a matter of national waking and awareness comperable to 9/11 and Pearl Harbor.

If we don't wake up soon, it'll be all she wrote.

Thanks, and in Prayer with you.

t.

[Constant]

No problem Carlos. I too have a hard time not lashing out on certain threads such as homosexuality and the war. You see, I am a Marine so alot of what people are arguing about on here or what they see on t.v. isn't even the begining of what is going on over there. I live it every day. It is so scary for me to know that any day now my husband or myself could be over there. Another thing is that my half sister is a homosexual. I love her dearly but I don't love the homosexuality. So, lash out all you want.

[carlos123]

You know what really concerns me even more than the immediate Terri situation is the rampant deception occuring in our country. Even among Christians.

The Terri situation has brought some of that deception out into the open for which I am thankful.

But, if one is not deep in the Word and ever focusing on what God's view on things is, it is so very, very easy to get swept away in seemingly logical thinking that promotes ungodliness.

And THAT is scary considering that most people are NOT into the Word. Even many Christians do not read it much if at all on their own and only hear it preached on Sundays.

What I hear people saying on TV, over the Internet, and even in some Christian circles gives me little hope that righteousness can once again prevail in the U.S. There is so much deception going on and no amount of logic, no amount of reasoned argument seems able to overcome the deception. It's as if people's minds are made up and that's all there is to it.

People, even so-called Christians, want to have their ears tickled and don't want to hear the truth. Paul said as much would happen in the last days.

There are entire groups of people who talk about how we are a nation of laws (and we are) but who do not give allegiance to the higher law of God. As such they remain bound to the law of man as the highest representation of what is good even if some of those laws uphold evil. THAT is scary! For that kind of thinking, that puts men in black robes above the higher law of God leads inevitably to tyranny of the judiciary, if not to other more insidious forms of wicked government.

American's in general have become a nation of moral cowards. More interested in maintaining a comfortable standard of living than in standing up for what is right at the risk of life and limb to do so. I speak in general for there are certainly exceptional Americans still, who make me proud but they seem to be so few and far between these days.

Christians have lost so much ground. We lost on prayer in the schools. We lost on abortion. We've lost over moral issues such that States can no longer make laws to uphold righteousness in areas that are now considered private to our bedrooms.

We're loosing on homosexuality and gay marriage and the definition of marriage. We're loosing over the mistaken notion of church / state seperation as being equal to removing every reference to God in the public square.

We will in all likelihood soon loose tax exempt status for churches. We may end up loosing the right to speak out against the evil of homosexuality or various other sins if it comes to be seen as hate speech. Printers in Canada are being prosecuted and fined for not wanting in good conscence to print literature promoting homosexuality. Teachers in Canada (where I live - though I am a U.S. citizen) are being fired for speaking out against homosexuality in some localities even if such speech is done outside their teaching position. I see the inevitable cloud of such unrighteousness heading South accross the border into the States.

And as if that wasn't bad enough Christians remain disunited and bickering over Words from Scripture that should be clear. I don't know how many Christians I have discussed doctrinal issues with who either do not see what the Word says in plain English or who perhaps don't want to see. It's not that my ideas of what the Word says are always right on. It's not that I am such a Biblical scholar that I always and in every way see what the Word says clearly. But I can speak and write and read English and in reading the Word I just don't see so many of the things that Christians say is there.

I read of Paul's admonition to stick to what is written, and I ask myself how it is that people otherwise versed in the English language can end up declaring the same words I read to mean things that aren't even there.

I just don't get it when that happens.

Christians argue and argue over all kinds of opinions yet completely miss what is written. I mean the Bible is really not that hard to understand if one has a humble heart and a willingness to trust what God says.

Yet the Church is absolutely FULL of pointless wranglings and ridiculous argument over what the Word says.

Christians as a whole have become so complacent. When school prayer was taken from our public schools we fought it. When abortion was being decided as an issue, we fought. Now that we have lost we tend to live with acceptance of things that we once thought were a curse. Adulterly used to be a big deal. No more. Even Christians are divorcing and getting remarried at rates comparable to those of the ungodly.

I just don't know what to think of all this. Sometimes it seems so hopeless in that I am just one little, tiny voice in a wilderness of mediocrity and of sin. Even in the Church.

Sometimes I even doubt the existance of God for I frankly do not often see God within His Body, the Church.

I don't mean to sound depressive. I do believe God is there. I do believe there is hope. And I will continue to do what I can and have every intention of doing more about the things I see happening. Especially within the Church. It's just that sometimes, by sight, things seem so incredibly bleak.

Perhaps the Lord has needed to bring the Church low in order to lead us as a broken and willing people to be, as in New Testament times, a light on a hill. The salt of the Earth. And the radiance of His Glory among men.

Carlos

[Constant]

I can understand your discouragment. It is hard when you feel like sometimes you are the onlyone reaching out and caring. America has come to be self involved at times but not everyone is like that. I was watching the news and there are so many people picketting outside of Terri's hospital for her. Not everyone can do that but God bless all who have the love in there heart to pray for her!

[Micah68]

Dear Carlos,

It's good that you feel the injustices going on today. The main answer is that these are the times spoken of in Jude verses 12 through 19 and in so many other places in the Bible. How does it feel to live along side of murmurers, complainers, those who walk after their own lusts, their mouths speaking great swelling words, having men's persons in admiration? We all know the feeling. I believe we have to speak out now against things that are unrighteous in our respective countries. But when we speak out, we had better be sure we have the Holy Ghost because without it we are no match for the evil of today.

God gives the Holy Ghost to them that obey. (Ac 5:32) So, knowing this Scripture, we have to ask ourselves if we do actually obey the Lord when He speaks to our hearts. The other thing we have to be sure of is are we praying in the Holy Ghost. Are we asking God according to His will? If I ask God for a brand new plasma TV, no matter how much faith I may have, He may choose not to give it to me because then I would spend too much time watching it and not reading His Word.

In the Terri case, I'm not so sure about God's will. I would pray that God's will be done for her. This case has done much in the U.S. beyond your comments. If you think rationally about it for a minute, you will see some of it. Many years ago, if the same thing had happened, she would have passed on long ago because there would have been no way to feed her and she would have starved to death naturally. It's only because we have feeding tubes that this becomes such an issue. I'm not saying that I think that she should be allowed to pass. I'm just saying that it would have been natural years ago. Also, it seems to me that both sides of the family are being very hateful towards each other. This has been going on for many years. If the parents want to take care of her, why doesn't her husband just let them? It's a mystery to me. On the other hand, I understand that it must be very difficult for him. Some people are not strong enough to stay without a spouse for so many years.

The whole situation has brought up so much passion from all sides of the issue. I wish people would get so passionate about abortion where children are being murdered outright every single day or about same sex marriages where God's Word is being blasphemed and where Christians are made to live in an environment like Sodom and Gomorrha. There are so many things about which God can judge us all because we have allowed things either in our lives or in the lives of our communities and countries. People think that the status quo is just going to continue on the way it has and in the meantime evil takes total advantage. While the country sleeps, evil is taking over. How long will we continue to allow this to happen? Maybe that is what God, our loving Father, is waiting for us to decide. He has been very long suffering with us but how long will we let it go on before we stand up and say, "No more."

Where there is no vision the people perish. We are perishing because we have lost the vision. What vision? God's vision for our world. He put it all in a book called the Bible. He came as Jesus and said, this is how to live. Be like me. He was like the loving vineyard keeper who gave everything to nurture his vineyard and yet it grew nothing but brambles. We have to get back to basics. We have to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children and vice versa lest he come and smite the earth with a curse.

Let's pray that doesn't happen. Let's pray about what we personally can do. Let's do something to change our world. It can't be done out of hate or over-emotion. But in love and principle, God can use us to help change our world. I believe there are people out there who do feel the frustration with the way things are going. There are people who are willing to stand up and speak out against the evil and the injustice. May they find each other and unite. Sorry this was so long.

[Guest Your_love_is_the_anchor]

I was extremely disturbed to read in the National Post today that the majority of Christians support the decision to end Terri Shiavo's life.

[Imamom]

On Terri's parents...They fight to keep Terri alive by use of feeding tube. This battle has been fought and won in the past. Not seeming so this time. Mom and dad are devastated. Oh our Terri. Christians jump on the scene in an attempt to force feed Ms. Terri to help keep her alive (in reality at this time delaying the final outcome). Christians are arrested for these attempts. Hello...what about the parents. If it were my kid and I felt so strongly that the possibility was there for recovery, I would have spent the years exercising her joints, sticking water and food in her mouth. Therapy was apparently cancelled but there is no reason that it needed stopped. To parents out there, if your child was starving to death because they could not eat, wouldn't you work diligently to teach the task?...or would you leave it up to someone else? Applause to those who want to go the extra mile.