A Good Friday Contemplation

 
The stores are full of people buying Easter candy, grass and baskets.

The shelves are full of chocolate bunnies and fluffy lambs.

People are coloring Easter eggs and sending cards.

Choirs are rehearsing Resurrection music.

Altars are bare, waiting for Sunday morning.

Meanwhile, Ms. Schiavo is dying. The consensus on whether this is a good thing or a bad thing is divided and vitriolic. How it "should" come out depends on where you stand vis-à-vis the law, Ms. Schiavo's intent, or perhaps a consideration for what is "best" for all concerned.

At ShrinkWrapped the doctor asks where our empathy has gone. He questions whether or not we're so narcissistic that we have lost all fellow feeling

Without knowing what is going on in Terri Schiavo's mind, we are left with the next best thing, our empathy. Imagine yourself being compelled to starve to death. If you were guaranteed you would feel no suffering, would you agree to this? If you were told there was a 10% chance you would experience all the pain and suffering of starvation and dehydration and then die, likely after first having seizures, would you accept that risk? 25%? 75%? We have no idea what she is experiencing and no way to find out.

Here is something to think about for this Good Friday: Ms. Schiavo is not going to die of starvation. She is going to die of thirst.

Weep not for her -- weep for your children. They will inherit the world she is slowly, slowly leaving.