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Thursday, March 31, 2005

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"Almost all of America mourns the passing of Terri Schiavo who this day has gone to God. We say "almost all of America" because we know there are some who seemed to eagerly await and even hasten her painful death. Terri Schiavo never made her wishes clear, that she would want her feeding tube removed in this type of situation, yet an out-of-control state judge and an unfeeling husband decided that she should starve to death. This is a dark day for all of America."

---Austin Ruse, President, Culture of Life Foundation.

"Among those of religious conviction Christians and Jews will correctly see the death of Terry Schiavo as yet another instance of social failure.

The minimum requirements of a good society, a society characterized by good governance and fellow feeling, include primarily care for the weak and vulnerable. Our society failed to protect Terri Schiavo. By allowing her, indeed causing her to starve to death, we showed again that our society privileges abstractions like the "right to die" over human beings.

At some point, a society that increasingly opts for death over life may find itself, in the coarse language applied to Terri Schiavo, in a "permanent vegetative state."

---Dr. Joseph Capizzi, Fellow in Religion and Ethics, Culture of Life Foundation, Associate Professor of Theology, Catholic University of America.

The Culture of Life Foundation is a Washington DC-based research institute dedicated to the gathering and dissemination of the facts and science related to the culture of life broadly understood.

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