Posted on 03/27/2005 10:49:55 AM PST by Will Evil Triumph
For Christians, Good Friday is the day to recall the Passion of Jesus Christ -- the last hours of Christ on earth.
It is also a day when Christians worldwide are painfully reminded that the contradictions of the human heart that led to Christ’s death are timeless. There is no better proof of that than the very real passion play that has been unfolding in Florida – quite literally the Passion of Terri Schiavo....
(Excerpt) Read more at childofreagan.com ...
Christ was sentenced to death by the legal authority of his day. Terri Schiavo is facing death by the judgment of today’s legal authorities.
The Roman puts Christ to death in the most horrific way known to them – death by crucifixion. Terri Schiavo is being denied food and water, thus ensuring a slow starvation, a horrific death.
BUMP
Excellent article. There's an innocent woman suffering because of a modern day demonic cult of death.
BUMP
I am glad Terri is putting up a strong fight for life. I would probably give up if this happened to me. Ultimately though she will lose her life. How fitting it would be if immediately after that happened there were to be an earthquake, with clouds suddenly rolling in striking fear in the hearts of people on the scene. No I am not comparing Terri's impending death with the crucifixion, but it is a barbarous act nonetheless.
There's a big difference between Jesus and Terri Schiavo - Jesus was *sinless*. Terri is not, like all of mankind (that includes men and women).
Jesus's mission was to take on all of mankind's sin and pay for it, and He completed that task. Who is Terri dying for? No one.
Jesus willingly laid down His life to experience God's righteous judgement on our behalf. His torture on the cross didn't begin to compare to the judgement for man's sins.
Articles like this demean Jesus's death and expose the author's ignorance/lack of understanding of the nature of Jesus's like, death and resurrection.
I don't think this demeans Jesus' death one iota.
Did St. Francis's stigmata demean Jesus' death?
Does the suffering of anyone who unites their suffering with Christ on the cross demean the Saviour's actions?
It's very similar to the Crucifixion, because after all the lies, spin, and emotion had stopped and Christ was buried, the people stopped and thought "Oh my God! What have we done? We've crucified an innocent man!!!" The Christian church was then given the breath of life. After the resurrection became common knowledge, the Church was cemented.
The same thing will happen when the left wing demonic death cult returns to it's cave. The American people will slow down and actually think about what we've REALLY done.
You're looking at the issue from the point of Christ purpose. Terri's death is not for a reason except to embolden the left wing cult of death, but the GULITINESS of killing a person who has committed no crime is the correlation. Terri is also a sacrificial lamb for the left wing minions power, just like that of the political priests of ancient Israel.
If the death of martyrs is meaningless, then why did Jesus ask his disciples: "Can you drink of the chalice from which I am to drink?"
Terri's death is redemptive, as is the suffering and the death of every Christian. Our personal sufferings and our own death, as Saint Paul puts it, "Makes up for what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ." In other words, the suffering and death of Jesus accomplished HIS mission from the Father. But we cannot participate in the divine life given to us by Christ unless, by our own suffering, we first die to our own will and our attachment to creatures.
The idea that the suffering and death of everyone but Jesus is meaningless is contrary to Scripture.
I think Terri can relate very well with what the Psalmist wrote in Psalms 63:
1 O God, you are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water.
2 I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
3 Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.
4 I will praise you as long as I live,
and in your name I will lift up my hands.
5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you.
6 On my bed I remember you;
I think of you through the watches of the night.
7 Because you are my help,
I sing in the shadow of your wings.
8 My soul clings to you;
your right hand upholds me.
9 They who seek my life will be destroyed;
they will go down to the depths of the earth.
10 They will be given over to the sword
and become food for jackals.
11 But the king will rejoice in God;
all who swear by God's name will praise him,
while the mouths of liars will be silenced.
If personal suffering is redemptive then God is a sadist.
If personal suffering "completes" something lacking in the Cross event of Christ, then you should applaud any suffering that Terri Schiavo is experiencing as salvific and meritorious.
Terri has made the living Way of the Cross from her hospice bed during the past six weeks of Lent.
But:
Instead of a Simon to help carry her cross, she had a policeman next to her bed to keep away the ones who truly love her.
Instead of a Veronica to wipe her face, she had Felos to look upon her with dispassion and contempt.
Instead of her loving mother to take her in her lap when at last the struggle is over, she has Michael Schiavo to cremate her.
*****
Lord have mercy on your daughter Terri, as she is soon to pass from death into life, to rejoice in the Resurrection with You. Amen.
Excellent piece that describes the many parallels between the suffering of Terri Schiavo and the Passion of Christ.
After Terri is gone, I won't hold my breath waiting for the media to report on the details on how painful it must have been for her, and how cruel it was to subject her parents and siblings to this. Not to mention how dangerous the ramifications are for the future of our nation. But as more Americans learn the true details, more and more people will realize how wrong they were to say this was just a "private family" matter.
Terri is not a Christian martyr. She is a woman who, for fifteen years, has suffered from what her family- and court-appointed doctors agree is case of "severe cortical atrophy".
Let's be very clear about what this means. Over the course of her illness, Terri's cortex tissue, which makes up more than 80% of her brain, has died and withered away. Virtually all of the area of her brain capable of thought, memory, voluntary action and the processing of sensory input is gone. Neurologists appointed by the courts to examine Terri have consistently reported that her cortex has been replaced by scar tissue and spinal fluid.
Brain scans show no activity. Zero percent. Patients evaluated as being in a persistent vegetative state typically show up to 5% of the normal level of cortical neural activity. Terry shows absolutely none. Spinal fluid cannot think.
The Florida courts have consistently backed Michael Schiavo's decision in regard to his wife because no knowledgeable person involved in this case disputes this absence of brain activity, or what it means. Some people claim that she is in a coma. This is false. She no longer even has the brain tissue that would permit such a diagnosis. She's not going to "wake up" and somehow become the old Terri again. Given that most of her brain has turned to liquid, this cannot happen.
The only part of her brain that functions is her brain stem, which allows the continued functioning of some - not all - of her involuntary functions. She can breathe, her heart continues to beat, and she is able to metabolize food and water. That's all. Personality, memory, reason are gone.
Those who claim that she is victimized by some contemporary cult of death act as if death is somehow optional. The controversy over her care and custody is a denial of the fundamental fact of human existence, that life is finite. At any time in history up a generation or ago, even the most devout Christians devoted to the care of people in Terri's condition would have allowed her to die peacefully and mercifully. They would have done so in recognition of the mystery of existence and faith, which even the most invasive and miraculous medical techniques cannot mitigate.
Every day, in every state of the union, families are faced with the same choice which confronted Michael Schiavo. They make their agonizing decisions in private, with the counsel of doctors, relatives and clergy. This is at it should be.
In these circumstances, are those who chose to allow life to end mercifully murderers? Of course not.
Was Tom Delay a murderer when he assented to the withdrawal of life-giving care from his father after the latter's brain injury 16 years ago?
Michael Schiavo has been living with an other women for quite some time. Why did he not divorce Terri ages ago and allow her own family to care for her?
Neither will happen.
Now there you go discerning and using common sense. That is forbidden in this forum on this very emotional issue with all sides fanning the flames of passion. Shame on you for being rational and thoughtful.
Why indeed? I don't know - and neither do you. A lot of slimy ulterior motives are being ascribed to Michael Schiavo by people who have no basis upon which to judge him other than what they see on TV. In other words, no basis at all.
This sad story is enough of a soap opera as it is. There is far too much mudslinging and self-righteous moralizing going on here.
I have nothing to say about Mr. Schiavo one way or another. But consider this - his decision regarding Terri has exposed him to vilification, slander and infamy. He, his siblings, and their children have received death threats, which have forced Michael and his brother Scott to leave their homes.
Could it be that maybe - just maybe - he is acting out of honourable motives, and really does want to release his wife from a position which he sincerely believes Terri herself considered intolerable before her incapacity?
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