Posted on 02/14/2010 10:04:41 AM PST by wagglebee
Rome, Italy, Feb 10, 2010 / 07:12 pm (CNA).- A year after the death of Eluana Englaro, known as Italy's Terri Schiavo, the president of the Pontifical Academy for Life is encouraging Catholics to defend life from conception to natural death.
Recalling the case of 38-year-old Englaro, whose feeding tube was removed after being in a coma for 17 years, Archbishop Rino Fisichella told the magazine Il Sussidiario that the painful incident tore our social fabric, especially because the people were not properly informed.
The Englaro case, he continued, was a very sad page in our history: a girl who was seriously ill, but alive was deprived of nourishment - she was dehydrated and exposed. Contrary to what was reported, it led to great suffering and death.
After explaining that the Church should always be prepared for new bioethical challenges, the archbishop referred to the responsibility of the media to provide appropriate information.
In recent days the media has finally reported on an important scientific discovery: In Belgium, several doctors have shown that brain activity can be observed, even if minimal, in people who are in a 'vegetative state' - a term which I dont think is correct. He went on to explain that vegetative state is an expression that does not measure up to the objectivity of the clinical data. It is false and misleading.
Archbishop Fisichella also said that Catholics have the important task of building greater consensus on issues having their foundation in natural law and that transcend cultural, religious and political differences.
Catholics should be on the front lines of the defense of life in all of its manifestations, from conception to natural death, aware of the great responsibility they have in defending these principles, he concluded.
He is exactly right.
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That is why children are no longer seen as a gift from God, but a burden, why babies can be killed in the womb , much as you might do with an unwanted litter,in some places handicapped infants allowed to starve to death,. children think nothing of inflicting violence on each other , society wants to reduce the non productive member so they have more money...
When God is removed from creation..of what special value is any creation ? A man=a dog= a spider = a tomato plant...just life nothing noteworthy here, just keep moving along.. while they starve the helpless and soon the elderly, men can avert their eyes
Starting with the Age of Reason (I'm sure it happened earlier, but it has been going on continuously since the Age of Reason) some have tried to replace God with intellect.
This has lead to a form of nihilism where life has no inherent value, only "ideas" and "theories" matter.
For a couple centuries this seemed okay, but then the French Revolution occurred and millions died BECAUSE of intellectual thoughts (some will try to say that this happened earlier with the Reformation and Counter Reformation, but those deaths, while horrible, were about beliefs in God, NOT denial of God).
These deaths continued by the millions in the communist revolutions in Russia, World War II and the expansion of communism.
Then in the mid-20th century the intellectual atheists succeeded in convincing many people that war was inherently wrong, but that killing people was still acceptable, hence abortion, euthanasia and the "green movement".
The worldwide abortion death toll in the past century is more than ONE BILLION HUMAN BEINGS, this exceeds the number of lives lost in all of the wars, famines, plagues and natural disasters in the history of the world COMBINED. And now that abortion seems to be "accepted" around the world, the atheists are pushing euthanasia and the "green movement" where the living only have value if they are producing.
Recalling the case of 38-year-old Englaro, whose feeding tube was removed after being in a coma for 17 years, Archbishop Rino Fisichella told the magazine Il Sussidiario that the painful incident tore our social fabric, [and broke our hearts] especially because the people were not properly informed. [and lies were allowed to stand unchallenged by judges and others in positions of trust and power]The Englaro case, he continued, was a very sad page in our history: a girl who was seriously ill, but alive was deprived of nourishment - she was dehydrated and exposed. Contrary to what was reported, it led to great suffering and death.
After explaining that the Church should always be prepared for new bioethical challenges, the archbishop referred to the responsibility of the media to provide appropriate information.
As it also was for us here.
Thanks for posting this, wagglebee.
Related threads:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2455273/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2446358/posts
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