According to Hitchens, the result of MT's views was basically torture in the hospices. Needles were re-used (even after their tips had blunted) because an increase in pain for patients might help to save their souls, or so the theory went. Painkillers were not used, because that would lessen the pain, and therefore lessen the chances of a person going to Heaven.
If I'm in a hospital, and I'm in serious pain, I'm goint to want painkillers. How would you feel if someone deliberately denied you or a family member painkillers while you/they were suffering, because of some religious conviction?Mother Teresa has been favoured with huge sums of money during the past 30 years, but patients' illnesses have been wrongly diagnosed by unqualified sisters and volunteers unable to distinguish between the curable and incurable . Mother Teresa prefers providence to planning, and the very strictest economy is always enforced - much to the detriment of the patient's interests. It is interesting to note that, despite the enormous sums involved ($50 million remains in a cheque account in the Bronx), needles are used over and over again, and are rinsed under the cold water tap. The nuns' answer to "why are you not boiling water and sterilizing your needles?" was simple: "There's no point. There's no time." Perhaps the patients take too long to die, and hastening death saves money. Cynical as that may be, Mother Teresa's global income is more than enough to equip several first class clinics like some of the finest in the West that she herself has checked into. To a person in the last agonies of cancer, and suffering unbearable pain, she said with a smile: "You are suffering like Christ on the cross. So Jesus must be kissing you." A sign on the wall of the morgue of Mother Teresa's Home for the Dying reads "I am going to Heaven today".
Mary Loudon, a volunteer in Calcutta, was shocked by what she saw there. "It looked a bit like the photos of Belsen", she said. "All patients had shaved heads, there were old stretcher beds, no chairs, and not much medical care or painkillers". In another home, despite the existence of huge sums of money: "The sisters are rarely allowed to spend money on the poor they are trying to help. Instead they are forced to plead poverty, thus manipulating generous, credulous people into giving more goods, services and cash." So great wealth has no good effect on the lives of patients and volunteers. In a damp house heating remains off throughout winter and several sisters consequently got TB. This was stated by a woman who left the Missionaries of Charity for the same reason she joined it, "a love of her fellow humans".
Mother Teresa has a San Francisco hostel named The Gift of Love; it is for homeless men with HIV. They are not allowed to watch TV or smoke or drink or invite friends, not even when they are dying, and so, of course, they are exceptionally depressed. One man said how afraid he was of dying without morphine. It is hard to find anyone with a good word for The Gift of Love.
Is he just innocently telling sick people not to despair, or is upholding pain and suffering as good things?
If suffering is so beautiful, will Catholic hospitals prescribe the full amount of painkillers to patients, or will they withhold a little, just to make the place more holy? I thought the Catholic Church did away with its celebration of human suffering when it put the Inquisition to an end. Or did Mel Gibson bring all this ugly stuff back?
ping Thank you
When did that happen?
Perhaps your problem is that you either have not read, or have forgotten, the connection made between suffering and faith in the NT. Might I suggest a Lenten discipline of re-reading the New Testament, from start to finish?
Given the state of Christ's church in the West, a return of the Holy Inquisition in its entirety, not just some of its lessons, is very sorely needed.
You have serious problems and obviously don't understand what you are talking about.
"xm177e2"you write"If suffering is so beautiful, will Catholic hospitals prescribe the full amount of painkillers to patients, or will they withhold a little, just to make the place more holy?"I will write "Holy Cross" this is total "suffering"Thank you
Please post examples of any Catholic health care professional or Catholic hospital witholding painkillers against a patient's will for any but a valid medical reason.
My wife is a Catholic physician working at a Catholic hospital, and as far as I'm concerned, you just slandered her.
Stopped reading right there. His outburst during the broadcast of her funeral was one of the most spiteful, unsupported little temper tantrums I've ever had the displeasure of hearing.
Love the Hitch.
Did he ever follow the money trail and find out where the money was going?
Is there any scripture that supports this? Or is this more RCBS?
Your post is akin to a big hunk of idiot-meat, sandwiched between the above two pieces of jackass bread.
Me and some of my Opus Dei buddies have been checking up on your IP address and we know where you're at. We're thinking of paying you a little visit. Depending on your attitude from here on out, we may or may not bring with us some members of the Missionaries of Charity Special Torture Division and perhaps a handful of angry Swiss Guards, also.
We'll show you what suffering means.
Just shut up, OK? You know way too much. This is supposed to be a secret. Only a small number of Opus Dei special operatives and an elite Knights Templar unit are supposed to know this and here you are blabbing all over the internet.
What goes on in our hospices is none of your business.
You really should type in "sarcasm now off" when you say something this outrageous. Otherwise people might take you seriously or indistinguishable for a fool.
It is at these times we can strengthen our faith in Christ, and find comfort in the embrace of the Sacred Heart.
That's what the Pope meant, IMO.
I think you are reading the wrong message into one simple line.
**If suffering is so beautiful, will Catholic hospitals prescribe the full amount of painkillers to patients, or will they withhold a little, just to make the place more holy? **
Why so sarcastic?
Yours is a hateful, pitiful little mind, isn't it?
I pray for an abatement of your ignorance and spite...it threatens your redemption.
Repeating rumors from "The Atheist Foundation"? Come back when you have a source that is anything besides foaming-at-the-mouth hate mongerers.