Life Matters

"I will not let them starve!" vows a Catholic Relief Services solicitation headlined "Face The Facts."

Facing the facts about the incessant encroachments of "Catholic" euthanasia, we see that all too many Catholic bishops, theologians, and hospitals will not only "let them starve" but will help starve them!

The them Catholic Relief Services seeks to feed are four million starving Africans. The them Catholic apologists for euthanasia seek to starve are some 10,000 Americans like my father, Earl Appleby, Sr., living in coma since February 26, 1981.

• The Bishops...Dialoguing with the Devil

In December 1988, HLI's Fr. Paul Marx, O.S.B., and eighty other pro-life leaders, dubbed by The Wanderer "a virtual pro-life Who's Who," joined Citizens United Resisting Euthanasia (CURE) in writing Supreme Knight Virgil Dechant to protest the Knights of Columbus' underwriting of the Pope John Center's 1989 bioethics conference for bishops from America and abroad. We warned that the murder of persons in coma by starvation and dehydration will be debated and that Rev. Philip Boyle, O.P. would argue in favor of the untimely demise of these euthanasia victims.

Other anti-life propagandists present at the conference included Dr. Fred Plum, who testified for Nancy Jobes' killers, and Fr. Kevin O'Rourke, O.P., whose pro-euthanasia stand was reaffirmed in his Supreme Court brief supporting the starvation of Nancy Cruzan.

• The Knights...Reality vs. Rhetoric

Despite convention resolutions proclaiming that those who advocate legalized euthanasia will not be invited to any Knights of Columbus event nor allowed to rent or utilize facilities controlled by the Knights of Columbus, K-of-C funds were used to provide a platform for advocates of starvation-murder of our helpless brothers and sisters. As HLI Report readers know, this wasn't the first or last time K-of-C practices contradicted their rhetoric.

• Of Apostles and Apostates

Thanks to America's most pro-life and most courageous bishop, Austin Vaughn of New York, other bishops received packets prepared by CURE briefing them on the anti-life propaganda of the conference organizers.

After announcing that his employers would fund the starvation debate, K-of-C propagandist Russell Shaw proclaimed, "The teaching authority of the Church has not made a decision on this issue. To the best of our knowledge, the ethical views being presented in Dallas remain legitimate positions for Catholics to hold."

• The Lord..."Thou Shalt Not Kill"

God-fearing souls of any faith with knowledge of, and faith in, the Ten Commandments and the God Who decreed them will concur with my observation to St. Louis Post-Dispatch religion writer Pamela Schaeffer that "argumentation in favor of starving people in coma is tantamount to an attack on defenseless people. People will die as a result of this conference."

Euthanasia victims already have died due to the deadly deceptions at Dallas. Two brief items in the May 27,1990 National Catholic Register (NCR) indicate the malignant cells of "Catholic" euthanasia continue their cancerous growth within the Body of Christ.

• The Soldier...Betrayed Once More

Like my father, numbers of the 10,000 Americans living in coma have also been soldiers who have served their country. CURE was founded to protect potential euthanasia victims like Dad, many of whom are veterans. Veterans hospitals are an ideal testing ground for government euthanasia.

Consider Sgt. Arnold Shumosic, a 23 year-old Catholic, whose parents sought to starve him to death at the Ellsmere, Delaware, Veterans Administration hospital in 1988. The V.A. was only too willing to sacrifice Arnold's life on the altar of "quality," but, as Senator Jesse Helms wrote President Ronald Reagan, "For a soldier to die for his country on the field of battle is an honor. For his country to murder him in his hospital bed is a disgrace."

• The Deserter...A Private Matter

A spokesman for Wilmington Bishop Robert Mulvee, questioned about his employer’s silence, retorted, "There's no reason for us to make a statement. It's a private matter." Which led me to beseech a CURE prayer rally before the V.A. hospital, "Let us never again hear an ecclesiastical spokesman describe starvation-murder as a private matter."

But we have.

• The Pope John Center...Strike Two!

As the first NCR item noted above reports, the Pope John Center's Fr. Russell Smith advised the National Conference of Veterans Affairs Catholic Chaplains that decisions to starve euthanasia victims like Nancy Cruzan "should be made at the bedside."

The January 15, 1989 St. Louis Post Dispatch reported a difference of opinion on the foreseeable effects of the Pope John Center's bishops' conference:

"We find the idea of starving people to death immoral, and we will oppose it in every way," (Appleby) said. "The next call we get may be from a family at greater risk because some bishop went to the conference and got the idea that it's all right to starve people to death."

• Modernist Maturity

St. Louis Archbishop John L. May is among the 200 bishops planning to attend the workshop. May said the bishops were "fairly mature" in their understanding of medical ethics and are unlikely to be swept away by arguments.

• Treachery in Texas

The second NCR story features a statement by Texas bishops which is to be held as policy for Texas Catholic hospitals. The statement concludes that withdrawing of artificial [sic] nutrition and hydration from a permanently unconscious person is not abandoning them.

CURE's logo proclaims, "To Kill Is Not To Care." Those who would have us believe that starvation is not abandonment have abandoned human reason as well as divine love. The death of man's conscience will lead to the deaths of men. God save us all.

HLI Reports, September 1990

• The Pope John Center...Strike Three!

From "Catholic" Euthanasia—The Killing Continues (also available from CURE):

Like the proverbial bad penny that keeps turning up, the notorious Pope John Center is at it again, it being the promotion of euthanasia within and without the Catholic Church. . . .

Consider. . .the Pope John Center's latest anti-life video, "A Matter of Life and Death,". . .promoted with funds you may have foolishly dropped into the collection basket for the Catholic Communications Campaign.

• Catholic Euthanasia

Protect your life and the lives of those you love from catholic, that is, universal euthanasia (with or without a capital C). Contact CURE today for your free Life Support Directive.