Terri Schiavo Denied Last Communion

Three days after a Florida court ordered that Terri Schiavo's feeding tube be removed so she would starve to death, her priest was barred from administering the sacrament of Communion one last time before she dies.

During a visit on Saturday to the hospice where she currently resides, Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, were joined by Monsignor Thaddeus Malinowski, who came to administer the Catholic rite of Viaticum, the last communion for a Catholic before death, the Associated Press said.

Police officers guarding the entrance to the hospice told the Schindlers that ingestion of the Communion wafer would violate a doctor's order that nothing be placed in Terri's mouth.

Though the priest promised to use only a small piece of the wafer, moistened with water to prevent choking, an attorney for Terri's husband, Michael, barred the procedure, allowing Malinowski to administer only a "spiritual Communion."

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