Tuesday, October 28, 2003
Sarah, something you said during our earlier conversation got me to thinking. You mentioned the case in Florida with the woman on the feeding tube and said that while you respected the pro-life aspect of Governor Bush's assuming responsibility for feeding the woman as a good thing, you still thought it was scary that the government had that much power. These are my thoughts on the situation.
A government derives its authority, according to the Bible, from being "an agent of God to do good and punish evil", and as such is a legitimate and godly institution. This case is a clear cut example of government fulfilling that God-given role. It is not, as a professor I asked pointed out, as if the decision was being made simply to withhold medical treatment...people can sometimes still survive without it and if they do, you're not going to kill them yourself. To stop feeding a person can have only one end: death. And you'd have to be pretty stupid not to know it, which makes you a willing murderer, whom it is the government's duty to stop, regardless of what you think may be your "rights" in this situation.
What's really scary about this whole scenario is that government actually HAS to do this. John Jay once remarked, "You will be governed by the Bible or the bayonet." In other words, unless people are taught from the inside, to control themselves and to do good, the government will have to beat it into them from the outside. That is, after all, what governments are for. Time was, when to even consider doing something like this, starving a woman still fully alive, would have been unthinkable. Our Founders didn't specifically put this in the Constitution because it wasn't an issue in those days. Now it is, apparently, sadly, and THANK GOD one state government still lives up to its responsibility under the law. :-/
A government derives its authority, according to the Bible, from being "an agent of God to do good and punish evil", and as such is a legitimate and godly institution. This case is a clear cut example of government fulfilling that God-given role. It is not, as a professor I asked pointed out, as if the decision was being made simply to withhold medical treatment...people can sometimes still survive without it and if they do, you're not going to kill them yourself. To stop feeding a person can have only one end: death. And you'd have to be pretty stupid not to know it, which makes you a willing murderer, whom it is the government's duty to stop, regardless of what you think may be your "rights" in this situation.
What's really scary about this whole scenario is that government actually HAS to do this. John Jay once remarked, "You will be governed by the Bible or the bayonet." In other words, unless people are taught from the inside, to control themselves and to do good, the government will have to beat it into them from the outside. That is, after all, what governments are for. Time was, when to even consider doing something like this, starving a woman still fully alive, would have been unthinkable. Our Founders didn't specifically put this in the Constitution because it wasn't an issue in those days. Now it is, apparently, sadly, and THANK GOD one state government still lives up to its responsibility under the law. :-/
// posted by The Pendragon @ 8:03 PM 
