A Matter of Life or Death

Rev. Jeffrey Symynkywicz, February 1, 2009

            It was almost four years ago now, in March of 2005, that a young woman lay near death at a hospice in western Florida . Terri Schiavo was the victim of a heart attack and stroke and had been in a persistent vegetative state for over fifteen years. A large portion of her brain had been destroyed. Although she appeared to be awake, she could not think, interact, or communicate in any way whatsoever.

            In any other era, Terri Schiavo would have been dead a few days after falling ill. But she had been kept alive for fifteen years with a feeding tube. Seven years before, in 1998, her husband, Michael, had petitioned the courts to remove the tube, and let his wife finally die a peaceful, gentle, and painless death. He was convinced, he said, that Terri would not want to live this way; she had no quality of life, and all hope of recovery was long gone.

            In normal times, and under normal circumstances, that is what would have been done. It is the kind of decision made daily, constantly, in hospitals, hospices, and nursing homes across the country and around the world. It is always a painful and difficult decision to make, a tragic decision. The loss of a loved one, under any circumstances, can be all but impossible to bear, of course. But to have to decide when to take the step of actually stopping life support is as heart-rending a choice as any human being is ever called upon to make.

            Of course sometimes, perhaps often, this situation is made even more difficult by conflict and disagreement within the family of the person involved. In those cases, the person making the decision cries out for even more compassion and prayers and support. Our hearts should go out to them, and we should treat them as we would want to be treated should we have to face such an immense emotional ordeal, as perhaps some of us, some day, might. But, alas, that is not always what happens.

            In the case of Terri Schiavo, family tensions grew very bitter. When the Florida courts agreed with Michael Schiavo’s request to remove his wife’s feeding tube, her parents immediately turned to the media. They garnered wide support—from the radical anti-abortion group Operation Rescue; from the governor and legislature of the state of Florida ; from the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church; from a majority of the United States Congress; even from the President of the United States himself. All were enthusiastically enlisted in the campaign of Robert and Mary Schindler to “save their daughter [Terri] from murder”.

            One Republican congressman intoned: “In our public actions, we must build a culture of life that welcomes and defends all human life.”

            “I urge those who honor Terri Schiavo,” the President himself said, “to continue to work to build a culture of life where all Americans are welcomed and valued and protected.”

            Such sentiments from a man who, as Governor of Texas, has presided over 152 executions—more than took place in the rest of the country combined; the man who had cut the review time for each capital case from 30 minutes to just 15, a fraction of the hours and hours that governors in other states spend reviewing each capital case. We have to trust the courts to make the right decisions in these things Governor Bush had said. But now, as President, he showed no compunction whatsoever in abrogating what the courts of Florida had said to Michael Schiavo.

            If the question is one of defending life at all costs, then why didn’t the President intervene to save the life of Sun Hudson, a six-month old baby with a fatal form of dwarfism, who was allowed to die over the objection of his own mother—thanks to a Texas law which allows hospitals to pull the plug on life support to save money when further medical care is deemed “futile”? I don’t need to tell you which governor of Texas signed that bill—the Advance Directive Act of 1998—into law.

            In 1993, at a World Youth Rally in Denver , Pope John Paul II called upon those in attendance to defend what he called “a culture of life”. In 1995, that idea was formalized in a papal encyclical which contrasted a “culture of life” of which he dreamed, with the “culture of death” which the pope saw as dominant in much of modern society. A “culture of life”, the pope said, views all human life as intrinsically sacred, from the moment of conception through the moment of biological death. The encyclical referred to the values that such a “culture of life” would affirm.

            Conservative politicians were quick to take up the term and use it for their own purposes. In his first presidential campaign in the year 2000, George W. Bush used the term repeatedly, and it became a sort of shorthand for a whole constellation of conservative social values which he advocated involving abortion, birth control, stem cell research, and end of life choices. Over time, the constellation of values included in the term “culture of life” grew to include, at least implicitly, other “conservative” values like the “defense” of the traditional family and opposition to advances in gay rights and the sanctioning of same-sex marriage.

            It was a brilliant political maneuver. Naming one’s own particular political agenda as “a culture of life” is powerful—mainly because it puts those who disagree with such political stands (and that means a good number of us, I suppose) on the other side of the coin. If Side A has laid claim to the “culture of life” where does that leave those of us on Side B? Defending the “culture of death”? Great.

            At best, it leaves us in the position of having constantly to explain why we’re not really in favor of the “culture of death”, and that the issues are complicated and complex, and that, while everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, don’t always agree with what the “culture of life” means to some people.

            Which in this age of political sloganeering, and policy by bumper sticker, and three-second sound bites leaves those of us in the “culture of life—but…” camp back in the dust somewhere. (I heard a radio ad by Adlai Stevenson the other day, from one of his campaigns against Eisenhower; 1952 or 1956, I’m not sure which. It was five minutes long. A five minute political ad. Compared to most ads today, which run about twenty seconds, it seemed like a full-scale discourse on national policy. It also seemed interminably long and [frankly] boring, given how our attention spans have been downsized over the years. It could also be, of course, that Adlai, who was a Unitarian after all, was a little dryer than we’re used to in our politicians these days; but it also could well be that we’ve grown dumber than we used to be, when it comes to paying attention to the details of political life.)

            But maybe things are changing. Maybe the age of rule by slogan is over, and we might actually be getting a government which decides on policies according to what works, and what serves the common good, rather than according to what will score political points and get them re-elected over and over again. I know that I might be very naïve in thinking so, but maybe something like that is finally afoot in our national life and our national discourse.

            That gives us all the opportunity—men and women, straight and gay, black and white, conservative and liberals, Democrats and Republicans—the opportunity to reason through what a “culture of life”-- a culture that truly defends life—that advocates a consistent ethic of life—might really look like.

            Even in his encyclical in 1995 where the term “culture of life” was largely introduced to the world, John Paul II spoke not only of the Catholic hierarchy’s opposition to abortion and euthanasia, which might be expected. He also emphasized non-violence, social justice, human rights, and care for the environment as fundamental values in furthering a “culture of life”.

            To defend the “culture of life” then, even in the pope’s terms, means remembering the poor, the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the unjustly incarcerated. It calls us to measure our actions in light of the immortal words of Matthew 25: “I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you gave me no clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.”

            Where is the culture of life for the least of these among us?

            For too many people, the whole issue of the “right to life” revolves around the single issue of abortion. But unfortunately, as Congressman Barney Frank once said, for many “pro-life” advocates, the “right to life” begins at conception and ends at birth.

            I don’t pretend that the issue of abortion is an easy one, and it is one on which I’ve taken different stands at different points in my life. I now believe that the fundamental choice of whether or not to have an abortion must rest with the particular woman involved, and not with clergymen or judges or politicians or even doctors. That’s just where I think we need to draw the line in this very difficult issue, and that we need to support women who face such difficult decisions.

            But I also believe that the issue of abortion is one about which people of goodwill can disagree, and I understand that for some people the very idea of abortion is wrong, in all (or almost all) cases. I don’t agree with them. But I am willing to share this earth with them; I am willing to work together with them in making this world better.

            A consistent ethic of life, in my view, also means working with them in finding ways to make abortion a less necessary choice. Do you know that there were about 500,000 fewer abortions during the administration of Bill Clinton (who was pro-choice) than there were during the administration of George W. Bush (who was anti-choice)?

Perhaps there are more creative ways of defending a “culture of life” than through severe, draconian, either/or, for us/against us social policies.

            What does defending a “culture of life” mean to me?

            A culture of life would give women the right to choose whether or not to terminate a pregnancy. But it would stand by her fully should she decide to carry that child to term. It would provide adequate health care and nutrition and affordable housing and decent education for every child born in this land.

            A culture of life would declare that life is sacred. But it would also remind all men and women that our sexuality is sacred, too. It would empower all of our young people with comprehensive, accurate sex education and information. It would empower young women and young men alike to take full control over the great gift of human sexuality, and not to squander it in the face of a media that insists upon exploiting and commercializing it for its own profit.

            A culture of life would end the legal murder of capital punishment. It would condemn war crimes, whether committed by allies or enemies, in Dafur or in Gaza . It would never again plunge this nation into the nightmare of a pre-emptive, aggressive war.

            A culture of life would remind us, in the words of Forrest Church , that cutting back on food stamps at home or slicing foreign aid to abate famine abroad rips out untold numbers of feeding tubes. It would stop the world nightmare by which children die daily in Africa by the hundreds, by the thousands, without fanfare. Not children in some vegetative state, but children who stand on the verge of full and active and productive lives.

            Honoring life means ending the scourge of poverty and disease in this world, by generously sharing the world’s resources with one another. It means accepting the truth that we do, indeed, have the resources and the wherewithal to end poverty.

            A culture of life would be a culture of love. It would honor those who love one another, whatever their gender, race, religion, or sexual orientation. It would celebrate full and free marriage rights for all of its adult citizens.

            In the book of Deuteronomy in the Hebrew Bible, Moses tells the people of God, “Choose life so that you and your descendants may live.”

            May we, too, choose life, my friends. May we choose life by enhancing the quality of life for our whole human family. May we remember the bonds of life that connect us, the interdependent web of life of which we are part. And may all our efforts here on this earth, all these days we have before us now, be used in strengthening those bonds, and in making sure that our web of life is beautiful and strong and secure.

            May we choose life, and may we remember that there is no greater way to choose life than through the letting the power of love flow through our hearts, and energize our lives.

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