Life Choices

All throughout the news and media of late has been the ethical questions surrounding the Terri Schiavo case. And I have to tell you that I am perplexed, concerned and scared. I am perplexed because this has been going on for 15 years and now 'all of a sudden' (although it was apparently in the news a few years back) there is a frenzy around this case. I am concerned because our government has grown immensly in the last several weeks - surrounding this case. Where does this growth stop? How far is too far for the federal government to get involved? I heard tonight that Jeb Bush is trying to seek legal custody of her!!!!!! And I am scared that amidst all of this hype, politics and battle we are losing the fact that at the center of this is a woman, her husband and her family.

I don't know the answer to this question - but I have to say that in the last few days I have been asking myself "If you were this woman's pastor..." or "If you were the pastor of a family member..." what would you do? What would you say? How do you respond to a situation as enormous as this? And this quarter I am in both Ethics and Pastoral Care and we have spoken of this in ethics lightly, and I pray we will in Pastoral Care. If not, you can bet I bring it up!

So with that, I just continue to pray that God would shower Terri, her husband and her family with love, help them to have hope in the life that is beyond our earthly death, and that the community would be able to support both 'sides' of this family in the days and months to come.