Schiavo

This has to be one of themor gut-wrenching cases around. It was interesting to discuss this with my 7th graders: from the perspetive of Jewish law, the possibilities are limited, and actually pretty clear: it's murder to starve someone to death. And yet, and yet... 15 years of PVS. NO upper brain function. No hope of recovery. I cannot say anything other than that God values us all, disabled, brain dead, or whole and healthy. The fact that decisions like this are made all the time on the basis of economics -often when the family would like to continue to try to maintain their loved one - and sometimes even when there might really be hope for recovery...
If Terry Schiavo was a 50 year old garage mechanic, or a 70 year old African American woman, no one would ever have heard of her. I wonder if Schiavo's parents came to me and asked me whatto do, what I would say. I could tell them what Jewish law is; but I also feel that I would have to say to them that hope of recovery is pure fantasy, and htat as painful as it is, the need to move on and accept that thir beloved daughter will never return to them in this world.