A reader writes:
In our current archdiocesan paper is an article from Rome about the Terry Schiavo case. They talk about how a court decision to remove the feeding tube would lead us down the slippery slope to euthanasia.
Later in the article, it quotes the Florida Catholic Conference (representing the state’s Catholic bishops, saying: "The said Catholic teaching has a `presumption in favor` of providing nutrition and hydration, but `when the burdens exceed he benefits of providing them, they may be withdrawn or withheld. …`". A bit late the article quotes the bishops again, "`While withdrawal of Terri Schiavo’s nutrition and hydration will lead to her death, if this is being done because its provision would be too burdensome for her, it could be acceptable". This sounds to me like nothing more than a quality of life argument that leads directly to euthanasia and doesn’t seem to square with the Church’s teaching.
Can you clarify this?
I’ll try.
First, I should note that I am not up on all the recent episcopal pronouncements regarding Terry Schiavo. MORE INFO HERE.
Second, what you quote above is not out of line with Catholic moral teaching. There are conditions in which it is morally licit to remove nutrition and hydration because continuing to provide them itself may be doing damage to the patient.
For example: When my wife was dying, at some point her body stopped manufacturing albumin, which is essential for regulating the distribution of fluids in the body’s tissues. (INFO HERE.) At this point she had completely lost her appetite and was being fed intravenously. The fluid from the IVs were going out into her tissues and collecting there. Without albumin production, her body couldn’t process the fluids out of her system and so she got severe edema all over her body. Not to be too graphic, her arm swelled to elephantine proportions and her hand looked like a balloon with short little fingers sticking out of it.
At this point, the doctors told me that they were going to have to discontinue feeding because the feeding itself was harming her. The doctors explained that if feeding were not stopped, at some point (soon) her skin would rupture and she would have weeping sores, which would be bad for all manner of reasons (infection potential among them). Fortunately, Renee passed before it became necessary to discontinue feeding, but she was rapidly approaching the point where the feeding itself was more destructive than the benefit she was deriving from it. It was getting to the point that it would only be making her suffering worse and hastening her death through other means.
Thus there are situations in which it is morally licit to stop nutrition and hydration, but only when the nutrition and hydration are themselves more destructive to the patient than otherwise.
None of this applies to Terri Schiavo, of course. She is not dying, is not being harmed by her feeding (indeed, she Can Take Food Orally Her Husband Just Doesn’t Want It Given To Her That Way), and it would be murder to starve her to death.
That’s a great article. I wrote into the Diocese after I heard a quote attributed to Lynch from one of the newspapers local to the case. I was hoping that they’d deny the quote. They sent me the Bishop’s statement instead.
It is amazing to see the quotes from JPII which point towards feeding, then the slightly watered down but still pro-life Bishop’s Conference statement, then the horrid position piece from Lynch.
Here are some quotes:
“At the end of the day (the judicial, legislative days) the decision to remove Terri’s artificial feeding tube will be that of her husband, Michael. It is he who will give the order, not the courts or certainly the governor or legislature or the medical personnel surrounding and caring for Terri. In other words, as I have said from the beginning of this sad situation, the decision will be made within a family.”
That’s fine as a position of blame. That is, that those that have worked hard to preserve her life should not be blamed if saving her should fail. Unfortunately, it falls apart once he adds, “made within the family.” The husband has made clear by action that he doesn’t care for keeping Terri around at all. In this letter he is not censured by the bishop for being a de facto adulterer under Catholic teaching.
“Normally, at the end of life, families of the person in extremis agree that it is time to allow the Lord to call a loved one to Himself, feeling that they have done all they possibly might to provide alternatives to death, every possible treatment protocol which might be helpful has been attempted.”
Of course there is no treatment since, as per JPII and the Florida Conference, eating and drinking shouldn’t be aren’t treatment as such. I also chafe at the darn near heretical, “call…to himself”. The Lord doesn’t want us to die. That was never in the plan and is a product of human choice and diabolical influence.
“The legacy of Terri’s situation should not be that of those who love her the most loathing the actions of one another but of a heroic moment of concern for the feelings of each other, guided by moral and ethical considerations, with a single focus of achieving the best result for Terri.”
The problem is that the “moral and ethical” considerations should lead to providing food and water. Jimmy provides a heart wrenching example of when food and water could be withheld and therefore does an admirable job of making that matter clearer to us.
One of my ongoing frustrations with my interest in potentially converting to the Catholic Church is what seems to be its total unwillingness to chastise bishops that have gone clearly against church teaching. It would be acceptable if Bishop Lynch defended the position within the context of Church morals (the example used by Mr. Akin, an inability to excrete waste, untreatable blood sugar problems, etc.) but he doesn’t. He doesn’t even give lip-service to a rebuke to Terri’s husband for inviting scandal in his decision by living a life of <*gasp*> sin.
Found it
http://www.dioceseofstpete.org/content.php?P=119
With a link even!
Jimmy,
Thanks for the clarification regarding food and hydration.
One concern I’ve had is that the main argument people are using to help Terri Schiavo is that she is responsive and could take food and hydration on her own if trained. Doesn’t Catholic teaching state that even non-responsive patients are required food and hydration in most cases?
I hope we aren’t inadvertently setting the bar too high for future cases.
I went through this terrible situation with my own mother and when the IV and feeding tube became harmful because it was gathering in her tissues, we had to remove it. As long as it was doing her some good and no harm though we wanted her to have it. We knew it was palliative and not life saving.
I thought long and hard on that issue and I came to the conclusion that if we would have been obligated to give food and drink to a sick person in the same situation as the one in front of us now, a hundred years ago, we still must do so. If we choose to use high tech means to do so, we cannot withdraw those means without weaning the patient off so that we can hand feed them or they can do so themselves.
Terri deserves to be fed either by hand or high tech. Michael Schiavo should know better.
We had the same situation with my mom. We were told by both the doctor and the chaplain (a priest) that her body was no longer processing the food/water, that it was just pooling in her tissues. So we agreed to stop it, and she died less than 12 hours later. But I know we didn’t starve her to death. That was so very hard…
That’s a sensible position. You don’t make people eat stuff when they’re just going to throw it back up, frex.