Physical and cognitive disability should not mean one’s situation is considered “end of life,” yet too many persons who are not dying are described this way. Earlier this year, Oregon’s state legislature considered a bill that would have increased the number of medically vulnerable persons at risk of an untimely death. Oregon’s SB 494 would …
BASIC CARE, HUMAN DIGNITY, AND CARE FOR MEDICALLY VULNERABLE PERSONS Read More »
Attacks on autonomy and human dignity appear to be intensifying. Autonomy, of course, refers to our ability to act as independent human beings, with an innate and inviolable human dignity inherent to each of us, regardless of our physical, medical, emotional, psychological, or financial circumstances. It seems as if so many, however, are intent on …
In 2006, I was invited to speak in Alkoven, Austria at a conference on human rights located adjacent to Hartheim Castle. Hartheim Castle was built in the ninth century and, in the 19th century, it came to serve as a home for children with physical and mental disabilities. However, in the early 1940s, Hartheim’s humanitarian …
PROTECT THE INSTITUTIONALIZED AND DEFEAT THE INHUMANITY OF EUGENICS Read More »
The Catholic teaching is clear: “The ordinary care owed to a sick person cannot be legitimately interrupted.” (CCC 2279) Two Jesuit priests, Father John J. Paris, a professor emeritus at Boston College, and Father Kevin Wildes, a professor at St. Joseph’s University, recently published an article, “Making an idol of brain-injured patients.” The priests were …
TERRI SCHIAVO, THE BRAIN INJURED AND CHURCH TEACHING Read More »
Much has been written about Jahi McMath in recent days. The 13-year-old Oakland, California girl underwent surgery December 9, 2013 to remove her tonsils. She was declared “brain-dead” after going into cardiac arrest. Since that time, experts have opined on the ethics of the brain-death declaration, the family’s decision to transfer her to another facility, …
SCHINDLER: MY SISTER TERRI SCHIAVO WAS ALIVE LIKE JAHI MCMATH Read More »