SQJ Taipei

In 1990, Terry Schiavo suffered severe brain damage in 1990 which left her unable to care for herself. She has had to use a feeding tube for nutrients and fluids since the time of her accident.

To the best of my knowledge, Terri is not attached to any “life-support” system besides her feeding tube. It is also my understanding that her feeding tube is only attached at her mealtimes. Most media reports had led me to believe that Terri was on life-support and that she was in a “Persistant Vegetative State.”

Terri’s husband Michael has been trying for years to disconnect his wife’s feeding tube. The result of this action would be death by starvation. Terri’s parents are trying to prevent their daughter’s death. This has been fought in courts and in the Florida legislature for years, but has increased in intensity the last several months and especially the last few weeks. Currently, Michael Schiavo has “won” the right to remove the feeding tube on March 18th.

I have been aware of this story for some time, but only recently looked into the situation in depth for myself… and now feel prompted to share some thoughts and links with you.

I understand there are 2 sides to this story… but one must take a stand on one side or the other. The Christian view is always on the side of LIFE.

If you visit Terri’s Fight (currently unavailable now available), you can see video of Terri responding to stimuli and obviously showing joy when her mother approaches her and speaks with her. She responds to some commands. She appears (to me) to attempt to communicate.

The Wittenberg Gate is receiving submissions of articles about Terri’s plight and/or closely related subjects. If you don’t have anything to submit, you might want to check back later to view the articles that others submitted.

Joni & Friends is coming to the aid of Terri and you will find most of the news items on Joni’s website are related to Terri’s situation.

If you haven’t already read about Sarah Scantlin, she is a woman from Hutchinson, Kansas who had been in a coma since 1984 and recently started speaking.

Here’s a couple links from Focus on the Family that I will be visiting again soon… this one is the main link to the part of their site dealing with a variety of social issues… this one will take you to the section with information about “end-of-life” issues.

This link will take you to the recent archives of the Focus on the Family daily radio broadcast. You can scroll down to the February 23 broadcast to hear Carrie Earll and Joni Eareckson Tada speak about the issue.