There’s a lot of discouraging news out there, but if you were to pick just two stories to read off Headline Bistro today, make it these: they’re beautiful reminders that, even in the battle between the cultures of life and death, the truth is starkly evident to those who choose to see it.
First, in Italy – an increasingly secular country that, despite its Catholic roots, has an ever-dwindling Mass-attending population – we see Catholic hospitals and health workers refusing to take part in the euthanizing of 37-year-old Eluana Englaro.
For those who don’t know, Englaro’s case is reminiscent of Terri Schiavo’s in Florida a few years ago; the Italian woman has been in a car accident-related coma for 16 years, and her father wishes to stop feeding her and allow her to die in her vegetative state.
Last week, Italy’s top court ruled in favor of the father – but, in a situation that’s hard to imagine being imitated in the United States, Englaro’s doctors have so far refused to remove her feeding tube.
“Our hospitals are places of life, not death,” was the bold quote from the head of health of the Englaro family’s region.
The nuns caring for Englaro at the hospital have also pleaded that they be allowed to continue nourishing their patient, for her sake and “others in her condition.”
The president of the Lombardy region in which the hospital is located likewise spoke out, this time as a warning: doctors who assist in a euthanasia procedure will be disciplined for “failing to honor commitments to the well-being of their patients."
An Italian newspaper reported that Englaros’ father might take her abroad to end her life, but as the Italian justice minister said, “Anyone who believes in God is praying for Eluana.”
What’s amazing is that these are not official voices from the Church speaking out in defense of Eluana Englaro’s life – with the exception of the hospital nuns, they are lay people who see the dignity in every man and woman and know where true justice lies in this case. What is more, they are speaking from their positions of authority as government ministers and political leaders, unabashed at the thought of allowing personal convictions and the truth of the dignity of life to guide their work.
Would that more politicians, doctors and other leaders in our country have the courage to do the same – and that our nation, as a whole, would allow them. (The Health and Human Services proposed rule for conscience protection is being fiercely attacked by abortion proponents).
The second story takes place in Maryland and features an unlikely cast in another poignant example of what happens when people recognize the tragedy and horror of the destruction of innocent life: homicide detectives arranging a funeral – and coming as the only mourners – for a newborn baby found abandoned in a park.
The detectives named the baby Maria del Pilar, in homage of her Hispanic ethnicity but also the feast day on which she was born and died: that of the Virgin of El Pilar.
“This was a baby no one loved. This was a child who did absolutely nothing wrong,” said the head of major crimes in Prince George County.
While the baby’s mother was found and charged with murder, no one was coming forward to claim the child’s body and arrange a funeral. So the police department stepped in, a local funeral home donated a tiny coffin and a funeral was held this Monday.
“These are the kinds of victims your heart just breaks for, because they were completely innocent,” said a female detective who had helped organize a funeral for another abandoned newborn.
It’s heartbreakingly clear to all, from the story’s readers to those described in it, that not only was an innocent life taken, but that it was right – indeed, necessary – for Maria del Pilar to be treated with dignity and respect with her burial.
Is this evident in our nation’s abortion laws? Not at all – but it’s a step. When we recognize the humanity of even the tiniest person, we also know that there is something intrinsically wrong when she is left to die in a park by a mother who doesn’t want her child. We call that infanticide. What prevents us from taking the next step: that this crime only parallels an action we do consider legal, in which a mother who doesn’t want her child allows it to be killed in her own womb?
The Washington Post quoted a police chaplain as saying that most people don’t realize the bond formed between investigators and the victims whose murders they’re trying to solve.
That bond – that realization that, no matter her size or age, this baby was a living, human being deserving of dignity and rights – speaks volumes. And perhaps those homicide detectives are closer than so much of our society in recognizing the horror of taking her life: before or after she was born.
The most dreaded dispatch for first responders is a "dead baby call." Although first responders put on their 'game face' to keep a critical incident under control, the police officers and EMS personnel will carry a injury or death of a child scene with them for days, weeks, or longer. Most often they will relate such tragedies to their own family and will devote even more time and attention and love to their own children.
I am reminded of the passage from Jeremiah 31:15 and Matthew 2:18 "A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more." Let us lift up our police officers and EMS people in their duties of caring for citizens in the hour of their greatest need. "Stories of the Street:Images of the Human Condition" notes several critical incidents involving injury and death of children. (www.strategicbookpublishing.com/StoriesOfTheStreet.html
"The Light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it."
Rev. Steve Best, Police Chaplain Emeritus.
Posted by: Rev. Steve Best | November 20, 2008 at 08:42 AM