Friday, March 25, 2005

The View From Golgotha

Today is the 25th of March. In the Roman Calendar, it is usually the Feast of the Annunciation, when the Angel Gabriel came to Mary, and she conceived by the Holy Spirit. Since it falls on Good Friday, the usual practice in the Western church calls for its remembrance to be moved to the first available day after the Octave of Easter.

Tradition also held (and this is not actually verifiable, but a matter of pious belief), that the original Good Friday was indeed on that date of March 25, exactly nine months before "Christ Mass," and that Our Lord died on the same day he was conceived. Life and death were thus seen as coming full circle through Christ.

Today, at a hospice in Florida, a woman is dying on the cross of modernity. In complete violation of State and Federal law, a woman whose brain functions have all but ceased is being starved to death. The media has trotted out their own straw men, to assure us that she will feel no pain -- as if that makes her executioners any more human.

Were I the Governor of the State of Florida, I would order a special force of state police in riot gear to storm the facility, and take Ms Schiavo into custody, where she would be well cared for as long as she lived. Furthermore, I would equip myself along with these men, and personally lead them to their appointed target. Let any judge's sheriff or Federal marshal try to shoot a Governor of a sovereign State. I would dare them to their faces!

There are no other posts today, nor are any planned, until the Resurrection is upon us.
"All under the leaves and the leaves of life
   I met with virgins seven
And one of them was Mary mild,
   our Lord's best mother in heaven.

"Oh what are you seeking, you seven pretty maids,
   all under the leaves of life?"
"We are seeking for no leaves, Thomas,
   but for a friend of thine."

"Go down, go down into yonder town
   and sit in the gallery
And there you'll see sweet Jesus Christ,
   nailed to a big yew tree."

So down they went into yonder town
   as fast as foot could follow
And many a bitter and a grievous tear
   from them virgins' eyes did fall.

"Oh peace mother, oh peace mother,
   your weeping does me grieve,
But I will suffer this", he said,
   "for Adam and for Eve."

"Oh how can I my weeping leave,
   my sorrows undergo,
While I do see my own son die
   and sons I have no more."

He's laid his head on his right shoulder
   and death ha' struck him nigh,
"The holy ghost be with your soul,
   sweet mother now I die."

Oh the rose, the gentle rose,
   the fennel it grows so strong
Amen, good lord, your charity
   is the ending of my song.
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, return to the Lord, your God.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

20 or so things we have learned since Terri Schiavo's feeding tube was removed.

1) Jeb Bush, George W. Bush, and Tom Delay are all qaulified neurologists.

2) 22 successive court battles that all ended in exactly the same way means there is something wrong with the courts, not the Schindler's case.

3) Michael Schiavo is after money which is why he turned down 1 million dollars and 10 million dollars to sign over guardianship.

3a - corollary) Michael Schiavo wants to go off and live the life of a wild playboy, which is why he's spending every waking moment by Terri's bedside.

4) Congress and the State Legislature of Florida has nothing better to do than pry into the private medical affairs of others.

5) Pulling life support is bad in Florida when authorized by the legal next-of-kin, but pulling life support is good in Texas when you run out of money and the mother pleads not to pull the plug on her baby.

5a - corollary) Dying white women deserve special legislation to keep them alive. Dying black babies don't.

6) Medical diagnoses are best performed by watching highly edited videotape made by Randall Terry rather than in person by trained physicians.

7) Minimum wage-making nursing assistants are more qualified to diagnose a persistant vegetative state than experienced neurologists.

8) Cerebral spinal fluid is a magical potion that can mimic the entire functions of a missing cerebral cortex.

9) 15 years in the same persistant state is not really enough time to make an accurate diagnosis.

10) A feeding tube that infuses yellow nutritional goop is not really "life support".

11) Jesus was wrong when he said that a man and woman should leave their parents and cleave only to each other.

12) Marriage is the most sacred of all unions, except when it isn't.

13) Interfering in a family's private tragedy is a great reason to cut short a vacation, but getting a memo that warns a known terrorist is determined to strike inside the US isn't.

14) Right wing pro-lifers are the most compassionate people on Earth ... which is why they are hoping that Michael Schiavo dies a horrible painful death, and in some cases, robbing gun stores or offering money online to make sure it happens.

15) The Supreme Court of the United States and the State Supreme Court of Florida mean "Maybe" when they are saying "No!".

16) Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is a bleeding heart liberal.

17) 7 Supreme Court Justices were appointed by Republican presidents, so it's Clinton's fault.

18) A judge who makes rulings based on the law is obviously an atheist, liberal, Democratic activist even though he is a conservative, Republican, Southern Baptist.

19) Getting nominated for a Nobel Prize involves merely the recommendation of an American politician.

20) Terri's parents were so overwhelmed that Terri tried to tell them, on March 15, that "I waaaaaant to live," that they somehow forgot to mention it to the courts until they filed a brief ten days later.