Vatican Calls for Keeping Schiavo Alive

Euthanasia/Right to Die Forum

God could very easily perform a miracle while she has the feeding tube out.

Is that His will in this case?

And so why is the Vatican, once again, sticking their noses into political matters in the United States? or into anyone elses for that matter?
Since when is the United States a puppet of Rome?

If there was going to be a MIRACLE performed, I think that it would have been a long time ago!!!

And there is NO REASON why the Vatican should be getting involved. This is ALL a load of crap. Once again, religion, and politics, are getting involved where they shouldn't.

Are Terri and her family religious? Unless she is a follower of the Church, I don't see what the Vatican could possibly have to do with ANYTHING in this case.

Terri's parents are Catholic, and according to Michael, Terri was Catholic but not very religious.

I'm sorry... but what a severe load of CRAP!! Is her mother that brain dead, to believe that? Where does the bible state THAT?!??? ARGH! This is why gov't and religion shouldn't be involved!!! CRAP CRAP CRAP!

The Catholic Church should get involved, Terri is Catholic,she received Holy Communion thru her feeding tube and then wine in her mouth with a dropper. Communion again, She also received the Annointingof the sick or better known as last Rites.

All you non Catholics just love to have something to squawk about the Cathoics.

Here is the official response and it is very clear on its position:

Press Misrepresents Catholic Teaching on End of Life Issues
NewsMax.com Wires
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
The prominence of the Terri Schiavo case has brought unprecedented media attention to the Catholic Church's teaching on end-of-life issues. But media portrayals of Church teaching are often inaccurate and misleading, according to two prominent Catholic ethicists.

Father Thomas Williams, dean of the theology department of Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, and Richard Doerflinger, Deputy Director of the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, both said the Church makes a distinction between ordinary and extraordinary care. The first is always required while the second is not.
Story Continues Below



"The Church teaches that we have a moral obligation to support life," Doerflinger said. "That obligation has limits. People talk about ordinary and extraordinary means. That just means that when the efforts to sustain life start doing more harm than good to the patient the moral obligation ceases to apply. Even then you should never abandon a patient and never deny them the basic care owed to everyone because of their human dignity."
Father Williams quotes from Pope John Paul II's 1995 encyclical, The Gospel of Life, when trying to define extraordinary means.

"The Pope uses two sets of terms. For treatment to be considered extraordinary death must be 'imminent and inevitable' and the treatment would result in 'precarious and burdensome prolongation of life,'" he said. An example might be a cancer victim who, after several rounds of treatment, has found chemotherapy to be ineffective and foregoes the treatment in order to avoid its side effects.

Father Williams and Doerflinger said that in some instances it can be extremely difficult to determine the difference between extraordinary and ordinary care and that in such instances people must follow their conscience. But both men said the Schiavo case is clear cut.

"From a Catholic perspective, this is an open and shut case," Father Williams said. According to Doerflinger, "food and water should always be seen as basic care," a teaching made abundantly clear in an address by Pope John Paul II in March, 2004, he said.

It seems some of you anti Catholics would prefer the Holy Father stay out of the business of its flock. Thats not what Jesus preaches so look at it this way, We are against the removal of the feeding tube and declare that food and water are essential to life.

Delta

."

So the RCC and the far Christian right have the same agenda!

Surprise!

Agenda there is no AGENDA T it is the basic teachings of our Church.

What about the AGENDA of your Church? Do they feel that removing the tube is the right thing? Or are they waiting for a miracle before this woman goes thru the agonies of dying?

Do you know what is happening in her body as we speak?
Her organs are shutting down one by one. Its amazing she has lasted this long. My wish now is for God to take her and release her from her earthly body and pain. They are giving her Morphine,did you know that?

She is slowly disintegrating, no hydration means skin is falling off, her organs one by one will shut down as water is 98% of the total body weight.

She is suffering like Our LOrd did.

No excuse for this and how do you explain the Govtmt getting into this situation? Thats oK but the Catholic opinion is not. Phooey T.

I am Catholic and will print the truth
D

I have posted our view of this already on this forum.

So what's the RCC gonna do if John Paul needs to be on life support? Keep him on it for another 10-20 years?

And who will your pope be in the interim...he'd still be alive but nonfunctional?

We as Christians are the last people who should be afraid of death....why are these people focusing on physical life?....eternal life is more important for Christians.

And if she's saved...why keep her vegitative for another 50 years when she can be with Jesus in heaven straightaway.

That's just selfish and cruel!

Well I am sorry I missed your post. However the waiting is gonna be over shortly as she is in rapid heartbeat. Thats what happened to my Mom.

As far as Our Pope is concerned, He has enough brain power to step aside if he is unable to do his duties or over see them.

Believe me there are many many Cardinals licking their chops now as the Pope is receiving food thru a nasal feeding tube.
Only God knows what is to happen so I don't venture a guess.

D

Many Christians find the statement that is out there that "Terri is suffering like our Lord" offensive. Jesus was crucified on a cross. He had his full mental capabilities and was acutely aware of what was going on, he had people watching his suffering, and he did not have morphine. Terri is simply NOT there. She is not being tortured. She is drifting off as her body shuts down.

I agree but thats not what transpired. Hey have you figured out what Psyhogenic fugue is yet. I will pm you the answer.

D

You suffer from this?

"a dissociative disorder in which a person forgets who who they are and leaves home to creates a new life; during the fugue there is no memory of the former life; after recovering there is no memory for events during the dissociative state"

Did you move to create a new life?

WhAT? i FORGOT

D Yes it happended to me at Charlies death not to the extreme of creating a new life but trying to get away from theone I was living at the time.

Ahhh so Delta you were alluding to my Bourne problems in the Iraq forum!
How interesting!

I must have been in one of my fugues and did not comprehend what in the world you were saying.

Clear as crystal....
until tomorrow.

And Mystic, you've wondered about how I could do so many things in one life....so now you know!!!

There are ways to bring back the memory
when necessary.

As a medical practitioner myself, I can relate to some of the issues raised by the Schiavo case from a medical perspective. Most doctors would agree that they have a duty of care to provide to patients which comes before everything else - even if sometimes this goes against the wishes of the patient. Such duty of care encompasses the provision of basic care, basic life support, supportive measures such as pain relief, and so on. For instance, if someone sustains a gunshot wound and he's subsequently wheeled into the hospital, doctors are obliged to treat him, even if he blatantly refuses such treatment. The exceptions to this are 'extraordinary' or 'heroic' measures which include cardiopulmonary resuscitation, risky procedures which may cause more harm than good or those which are unlikely to prevent death , and so on. Under such circumstances, 'advanced directives' would apply.

In this case, the argument revolves around the provision of food and water through a nasogastric tube. Most doctors would agree that nutrition and hydration is a basic need, and should be provided as long as the means of providing them do not cause more harm than good. For instance, if Terri keeps pulling out the tube, or if she keeps suffering from aspiration pneumonia or nasal ulcers from the NG tube, then other alternatives of feeding would have to be considered, such as intravenous or percutaneous gastrostomy or jejunostomy feeding tubes. However, most doctors would also agree that anything other than a nasogastric tube would constitute 'extraordinary' measures, and hence would not be obliged to treat the patient under such circumstances. So from my point of view, this case IS indeed clear-cut; from a medical perspective, the onus is for her to be treated.

When making decisions to provide 'basic care', several factors need to be considered. First and foremost, one has to recognise the prime objective of such care. In the case of a gunshot victim, it's obvious - the victim needs surgery to save his life. In someone who has sustained a broken arm, it's to provide pain relief (the reduction of his fracture is secondary). In the case of Terri, it is not so much to save her life or to prolong it, but rather to offset discomfort and distress. To anyone who has never seen anyone die from starvation and dehydration, I can tell you from first hand experience (vicariously, of course) that it is not a pleasant experience at all. They always end up very distressed, confused, and will eventually suffer from electrolyte abnormalities (raised sodium, calcium, etc.) resulting in convulsions, bleeding, and multi-organ failure (kidneys, liver, brain, etc.). Given this, is it surprising that Terri has to be given morphine now that she is off feeding and hydration?

Would I persist in treating EVERYONE the same way under similar circumstances? It depends. If someone was terminally ill and doesn't have long to live (i.e. moribund), then one would have a case for not providing nutrition or hydration, especially if the effects of such inaction are unlikely to be encountered prior to death. Or if the only available route of administration is intravenous or other invasive methods, then it would indeed be cruel to subject the patient to treatments which will probably cause more harm than good. However, such dilemmas are not relevant in Terri's case. She is not moribund, nor is her condition terminal (in the sense that death is imminent or likely to happen relatively soon), nor 'vegetative' (since 'permanent vegetative state' is a medical diagnosis governed by a strict set of criteria). To withdraw basic care on the basis of quality of life (or a lack of it in this case) is a dangerous precedent. Where should we draw the line? Should all children with cerebral palsy or serious disability not be treated and provided with basic care when they need it? What about those with terminal illness - if they are going to die anyway, should basic treatment such as pain relief or relieve from the side effects of chemotherapy be withdrawn from their care?

Although I wouldn't regard the decision not to treat Terri as euthanasia, it isn't far from it. Euthanasia implies doctors actively ending a patient's life - however, inaction can also have the same outcome. Of all the oaths taken by doctors, the three I consider the most important are 'Do no harm', 'Relieve suffering whenever possible' and 'Comfort always'. From a medical perspective, the Schiavo case illustrates how NOT to behave as a doctor. Granted, the decision was political in the end, but the medical profession as a whole could have done more. We've collectively let down our own profession and the principles that we hold so dearly.

Note that what I've written reflects my opinion from a medical perspective. Although I'm a Catholic, I'm also a liberal - and I objected vehemently to President Bush's re-election and some of his policies - especially his foreign policy and his blatant exploitation of right-wing Christian tendencies for political gain. But for once, I'd have to agree with him on the Schiavo case.

The_Rebel

The_Rebel,

Thank you for what you have typed. Thank you for seeing Terri in the right light.

On a larger scale, if people start deeming others no longer a person like they have Terri, then we are in real trouble.

It is sad that people would laugh on my last sentence.

Terri did not have a nasal feeding tube. It was a tube inserted in her abdomen.

There are a couple of issues I'd like to clarify. Firstly, the diagnosis of PVS. As I've said previously, there is a strict set of criteria which has to be fulfilled in order to confirm its diagnosis. The criteria varies from one country to another, but is essentially based on the lack of self-awarenes. As far as I know, Terri hasn't fulfilled all the criteria. The evidence presented by 'experts' in the case are not completely objective but based on personal opinions. If you ask 100 experts on the subject, you're likely to get a range of responses (eg. definitely, maybe, no, don't know, partially maybe, partially definitely, partially no, etc.). We will never know with any degree of certainty. The only person to know is Terri herself. Secondly, do we know with any degree of certainty that her wishes were not to receive hydration and nutrition, apart from hearsay from her husband? Do we have any written or verbal evidence, or any 'advance directive' specific for such circumstances? How do we know that her husband has her best interests? He may well do, but do we know for certain? Thirdly, whether or not she is capable of feeling pain or distress (and this is by no means proven beyond any reasonable doubt), the fact that subjecting her to something which we know for sure causes distress and discomfort in people makes me feel extremely uneasy. The analogy is death by lethal injection, or shooting someone in the head. In both instances, death occurs instantaneously, the victim doesn't feel pain or distress, and both seem a humane way of dying. Does that make murder by either methods justifiable, or more acceptable than other forms of murder? Shouldn't we just kill Terri that way then, or by any other ways for that matter because she is unable to feel anything? Death by omission or commission may have different legal connotations and repercussions, but both mean the same in a medical sense.

As for Mystic's analogy regarding her grandmother, it seems obvious that she was dying - after all, she died after 2 weeks. Can we say the same about Terri? Would she have died in 4 weeks? 4 months? 1 year? The fact is we don't know.

In my opinion, the relevant question is whether or not providing food and water amounts to 'basic care' or 'extraordinary measures'. To give another analogy, if a pillow suddenly fell on top of her face and prevented her from breathing, would her doctors merely stand aside and watch her choke and struggle for breath and subsequently die (although she won't be able to feel it), when all that was required was to remove the pillow? We're not talking about performing a tracheostomy or commencing artificial ventilation, merely removing the pillow. This may be an extremely simplistic analogy but it does bear some relevance to the case in hand.

As for keeping her body functional, there are other things which we're already doing to maintain that, whether subconsciously or otherwise. What about letting her stay in a warm environment in her room, an air mattress which prevents pressure sores, performing physiotherapy on her to prevent ulcers, performing suction on her oropharynx, and so on - aren't these acts also meant to achieve the same objective? If not, shouldn't she be left outside, in the cold, unattended, drowning in her own respiratory secretions and covered with vomit, urine and faeces, covered with pressure sores and dying from hypothermia instead? These are all relevant questions consistent with the case in hand.

The_Rebel

Very well. Let me ask you Rebel, do you think there is any hope of recovery for her? I do not think so. Most of her Cerebral Cortex is gone. She is not cognative, and she cannot recover. Coupled with the fact that her husband wants to honor her wishes (who can benefit from no obvious gains), I do not understand why should her body not be allowed to die.

M.

Rebel, she has not had the tube in for 12 days. I think it is around 36+ hours since she has produced urine. IF they put the tube back in, what would the ramifications be?

As expected, it sounds as if she's anuric now - a sign of acute renal failure. Next, she'll be convulsing, and they'll need to medicate her for that. After that, her vital organs start to shut down - including her heart (cardiac arrest possible), lungs (she may just stop breathing spontaneously and choke), liver (she may bleed intra-abdominally) and so on.

The damage may already be irreversible. From simply providing fluids before all this transpired, if she is to be saved now, she'll need more than just fluids, including invasive treatments such as central venous access, dialysis, and so on, and this would indeed be cruel and do more harm than good.

Mystic, no I wasn't accusing you of personalizing the discussion, but I sensed that it might be heading that way, as with all discussions of an emotive nature. It was merely a pre-emptive gesture meant for everyone, not just yourself, so please don't take it personally.

The_Rebel

None of the doctors on TV here have mentioned convulsions. Do you think they just medicate her for that?

The convulsions are due to hyperkalaemia and hypercalcaemia - ie. abnormally raised potassium and calcium (kidneys normally excrete those and other chemicals; if they fail, those chemicals are left to circulate and accumulate in the bloodstream and tissues).

They may well medicate her with muscle relaxants and benzodiazepines or morphine, which will definitely accelerate the renal failure and her demise. It's not going to be a pretty nor pleasant sight - believe me. She isn't going to drift away 'gently in her sleep'. Whether or not those things are made known to the public remains to be seen. What do you think?

The_Rebel

Hey Rebel, in the veggie state, what parts of her brain are still processing information? I would imagie it varies form case to case.

If her body is on autopilot and there is no higher brain function, wouldn't the medication be a moot point?

-HECK!

A dramatically painful and agonizing death as described does not correspond to experiences of two people I know who witnessed such a similar death.

My Pastor's teenage daughter suffered from a rare genetic disease her entire life. She was immediately at birth put on ventilators etc when they fused her esophagus. The parents allowed this because there was hope of her recovery.
When she got really bad as a teenager she was put on IV's which made her nauseous.
She was conscious and aware, but she could not keep any food down, thus the IV's.
The doctor asked her what she wanted and she said she just wanted the nausea to go away.
So they removed the tubes and she died from starvation/loss of hydration.
And she died peacefully, no pain, remarkably no hunger either and she was fully conscious.

Last year another Pastor from KC, MO who I know personally as well, dealt with the same situation. His wife was taken off the feeding tubes and she, as well, died peacefully, no pain, remarkably no hunger either and she was fully conscious.

The brain may not be processing information but Rebel gave you a definitive description of the total breakdown of the body as a result of not obtaining hydration. Isn't his answers enough to make you all think that what is happening to Terri is countermount to legal torture and in the end murder?

It surely would have been more humane to give her a lethal injection then to withdraw all nutrients.

Its a sad day when we allow this to happen.

As a result of this case Lousiana now has a bill before the House which is called the Die With Dignity Bill. It will be interesting to see how the poloticians spin this here.
D

T What you assume as peace may not be. Have you thought of that?

D

The girl was conscious and could speak up to the very end.
She was the one who told her Daddy she was ok.
There was no assumption of peace she was able to speak clearly.

The same with the Pastor's wife in Missouri last year.

I stated the same thing about my grandma...I dont know if it was different for her because she refused to eat and drink herself, though I dont see how it could be different...but she didnt experience any pain either.

Ive heard more stories about people not suffering than people that have suffered.

The two you gave just added two more non-pain stories to the list as well.

Then the people in charge starved an innocent. I woul.dn't brag about these incidents. Sounds like cruel and inhumane treatment.

The same breakdown of the body had to occur, how could the parents condone such a thing?

If it were my kin Iwould keep them until God took them not man.

Ganight
D

How could the parents condone such a thing?

They watched her go through extreme pain and agony her entire life, yet she was the wisest and most mature Christian they had ever known.
It was her decision, she knew there was no hope of living any longer. She had already outlived the normal lifespan of such a disease by many years.
Every day that girl lived was a blessing for her and everyone around her.

And she wasn't afraid of dying....she looked forward to eternal life...and she knew the difference...and seeing Jesus face to face meant something to her.

Everytime my Pastor talks about her to the church he weeps...a grown man breaks down and weeps...its the saddest thing I have ever seen.

Now y'all got me thinking.
I better get one of those living wills.
I wouldn't want to trust a right wing Christian with my mortality...doctor or otherwise.

SWTT, you have your opinion, and I respect it. But for goodness' sake, please refrain from labelling others' opinions as 'right wing', 'liberal' or the like. I take exception to that. Some people's perceptions as to what constitutes right wing or liberal may be different to yours, and not everything is governed along those lines. Like I've said earlier, I do have a generally 'liberal' outlook when it comes to politics, but that doesn't make all my opinions 'liberal', and equally that doesn't necessarily render them 'right wing Christian ideals' when they're not considered 'liberal' in your book. You may not be aware of this, but comments such as yours are akin to other labels such as 'fanatical', 'selfish' and 'condescending'.

Some of you may have come across stories or personal experiences regading the lack (or presence) of suffering from dehydration and starvation, ad I do not doubt their sincerity nor authenticity. All I can do is to relate my own experiences as a medical person specialising in cancer, across all age ranges. I've seen hundred of patients suffer the effects of starvation and dehydration, and some of them do display clear signs of distress (but treatment was withdrawn anyway because there simply was no non-invasive way of providing it), and others do not. Those who don't are usually those who are near death. However, the lack of higher brain functions does not necessarily imply the inability to perceive pain, because brain functions are never lost completely under circumstances similar to Terri's, and even if it was so, there are localized effects of pain - such as localized reflex responses in someone who has had a complete spinal cord transection where peripheral pain impulses do not reach the brain but they are still 'perceived'. Pain itself produces noxious chemicals which may still reach the brain or other chemoreceptors in the body, resulting in localized or generalized reflex responses.

In any case, one can justify almost anything with examples - whether vicariously or otherwise, and we can keep going in circles doing so. The point is we will never know for certain how Terri would have perceived the effects of starvation and particularly dehydration. Like I've said before and I'll say again, 'expert' testimonies can be based on subjective opinion.
As an example, in the UK there have been two high-profile cases recently involving two world-renowned experts in child abuse and cot deaths. Over the past 3 decades, they had separately given evidence as expert witnesses in hundreds of those cases and many individuals ended up in jail based on their opinions. However, new evidence regarding many of those cases came to light, and the experts were subsequently discredited and many of the cases have been quashed based on wrongful conviction. Imagine if the UK still had Capital Punishment, what the consequeces would have been - so many people wrongfully condemned to death.

Heck, even if she was unable to feel anything (supposedly), if she starts to have convulsions or starts vomitting or display other symptoms, then she would still need to be medicated, on the basis of preserving her dignity. Or at least I hope so!

The_Rebel

Mel Gibson ,producer of The Passion Speaks his opinion on Terri's Case FYI
Mel Gibson: Terri's Killing Is 'Murder'

In his strongest comments yet on the Terri Schiavo case, Mel Gibson calls her killing "nothing more than state-sanctioned murder."



The actor and director spoke out Wednesday night in a telephone interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity.


"I heard their cry for help," Gibson explained his public comments. Gibson insisted that Terri Schiavo is not in a vegetative state.


Gibson said he decided to take a public stand because "it is completely wrong to deprive this poor woman of food and water."


He added that the court-ordered method of killing – depriving Terri Schiavo of basic sustenance – "is a prolonged and cruel execution."


Gibson said he is closely following the case and is astounded by the developments.


"I just sit here watching this whole scenario play out in front of me with my mouth wide open that our country has come to this," he said, adding, "I think it’s a really black day."

The actor offered little hope for Terri Schiavo at this point, describing the appeals as "too little too late."


"It’s nothing more than state-sanctioned murder," Gibson continued.


He was also disturbed that a local Florida judge was given the unquestioned power to sentence Schiavo to death.


"All the big guys, they’ve got their hands tied by some tinhorn judge down there," he said. "Come on. When they want to whip a judge, they got no problem getting Judge Moore in a heartbeat."


"It’s so wrong and I watch it, appalled and stunned, that we have gotten to this."

D ( From News Max)







•

March 31,2005 Terri has died may she rest in Peace

rebel

You live in the Uk and don't have to live here with what's going on in the culture war in the USA. So sit in that high tower and judge it's ok by me, but you will get a response.

Right wing Christian refers to anyone regardless of political persuation who feels the need to legislate my own personal choices in life outside of the law to fit their own religious/political agenda.

And that is condescention to the extreme...fanatical and selfish AND on top of that outside the realms of what Jesus and the Apostles taught.

This is transferred with the authority of the Author whom I talked to personally this moring. This is for all Christians to better understand the Medical reasons of Christs death but especially The Rebel. I read this story on Good Friday but was unable to get in touch with Bruce until today. He led me to where I could transfer his article.

How exactly did he die?
More than 2 billion Christians today commemorate the most famous public execution in history, and if most believers choose to reflect on faith's lessons about the death of Jesus Christ, a few with a curious bent have for years sought a more clinical enlightenment.
Friday, March 25, 2005
By Bruce Nolan
Staff writer

They are a small community. They include a French surgeon, a couple of American pathologists and a medical illustrator from suburban Birmingham, Ala., who lectured on the crucifixion before a full house at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans last week.




They say they are detached clinical investigators, but they are also deeply devout Christians.

"It's been like a theological journey. I feel it's enhanced my belief," said Floyd Hosmer, the medical illustrator who provided the artwork for a 1986 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association titled, "On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ."

Dr. William Edwards, a Mayo Clinic pathologist and lead author of the 1986 article, was a relatively new Christian who wanted to deploy his medical skills in service to his newly embraced faith, Hosmer recalled last week. Their article was, until now, the most recent authoritative investigation of the subject.

And Dr. Frederick Zugibe, a retired forensic pathologist, still attends Mass daily, long after he stopped monitoring the hearts and respirations of hundreds of heavily instrumented volunteers he belted bloodlessly to a special cross over several decades of research. In scores of papers and 52 years of research, Zugibe has developed his own take on crucifixion in a forthcoming book, "The Crucifixion of Jesus: A Forensic Inquiry."


Exquisitely cruel


The object of their attention is widely known but little understood, even today.

Crucifixion is solidly documented in ancient literature.

Public, degrading and exquisitely cruel, in the hands of Rome it was an instrument of state terror.

Roman authorities deployed it against revolutionaries, prisoners and slaves, once crucifying 6,000 followers of the rebel slave Spartacus for the edification of passers-by along the Appian Way.

But firsthand investigation of the brutal method is difficult; few remains of crucified victims have been found. The Gospel account of Christ's burial appears to document the slightest softening in the usual Roman malice: As the final humiliation, executioners usually left the corpse to rot on the cross, then disposed of it beyond the family's recovery.

That usually left clinical investigators to fall back almost exclusively on the Gospels' four accounts of Christ's Passion, supplemented by other ancient references to crucifixion and, before Zugibe, only the most limited experimentation.

In more recent years, some also have looked to the Shroud of Turin. That ancient cloth bears the faint imprint of a man who appears to bear crucifixion wounds. Although no Christian church officially asserts the image is that of Jesus, its custodian, the Catholic church, treats it with great reverence. Millions believe it is the burial shroud of Jesus.

In time, the shroud has worked its way into some crucifixion research as an authentic extra-Scriptural source. In his medical journal article, Edwards went so far as to cite it as a source of information about the crucifixion of Jesus, to the dismay of critics.

Zugibe is as fascinated by the shroud as by crucifixion -- and a believer in its authenticity. But "when I do my experiments, I close everything. I close the Bible and look at things from a totally scientific point of view," he said.


Early medical analysis


Although speculation kicked about for years before then, modern theories of the physiology of Christ's death seem to begin in 1937 when French surgeon Dr. Pierre Barbet published "The Five Wounds of Christ."

Later, using World War II accounts of German executions of concentration camp prisoners suspended by their hands, Barbet proposed that as Christ sagged from the crossbar, his rib cage expanded, leaving him unable to exhale properly.

He suggested that Christ pushed himself up with his feet until the pain required him to slump again. Hours of agonized migration up and down the cross left him exhausted -- until he finally asphyxiated.

In 1986, Hosmer, Edwards and the Rev. Wesley Gabel, a Methodist minister, collaborated in the medical journal to propose a complex of factors causing death, preceded by medical explanations for all the landmarks of the Passion accounts by the evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Luke's assertion that as Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane "his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground," seemed to be an example of hematidrosis, or stress-induced hemorrhage into the sweat glands, the JAMA authors wrote.

Working their way through Scripture, the JAMA authors sketched out the accumulating clinical effects of the Passion.

From the scourging: blood loss and pleural effusion, or the collection of fluid in the chest cavity; from the crucifixion: Barbet's lethal respiratory crisis; and throughout the ordeal, mounting exhaustion, falling blood pressure and deepening shock from fluid loss.

To all of that, they added the possibility of cardiac rupture at the moment of death -- a nod to a popular devotional notion that Christ died of a broken heart.

The JAMA article caused a storm in the medical community. A follow-up issue contained 17 letters on the subject, more than had ever been published on a single topic, the Washington Post reported at the time.

Most were critical. Most thought it a work of pseudo-science -- "forensic mythology," one author called it -- and questioned its appropriateness in a prestigious scientific journal.

Critics, Christian and otherwise, focused on the authors' use of Scripture -- not to mention the Shroud of Turin -- as a literal record from which reliable clinical observations could be deduced.

Conservative Christians had no difficulty in merging the four Gospels as historically accurate accounts. But liberal Protestants and many Catholic scholars saw the Gospels differently -- not as ancient videotape, but as theological accounts meant to present differently nuanced accounts of the life of Jesus to different audiences.

In his two-volume "The Death of the Messiah," the Rev. Raymond Brown, a leading Catholic Scripture scholar, chided the JAMA authors for speculating far afield from their field of expertise "without realizing that any or all of these (narrative) features might embody theological symbolism rather than historical description."


Crucifixion fascination


Zugibe, however, takes a different approach.

From the day as a boy when he encountered a medical account of the crucifixion by a British author in the popular religious press, Zugibe acknowledges he has been fascinated by the grisly phenomenon of crucifixion.

It is the same appeal that led him to a Ph.D. in anatomy, then a medical degree and a 34-year career as the chief medical examiner for Rockland County, N.Y., where he probed the cause of death of thousands of victims of accident, crime and disease.

Zugibe began investigating crucifixion as a young man. With a professor's permission, he said, he once drove a nail through the wrist of a cadaver in gross anatomy lab. Uniquely, he says, he began doing elaborate bloodless experiments with volunteers.

"What I found was that Barbet was totally incorrect on 98 percent of everything he said," Zugibe said.

Zugibe commissioned a special cross fitted with belts and moveable gloves so at least some effects of crucifixion could be observed at various body positions.

He fitted volunteers with strain gauges to record the pull from their arms. He wired them to electrocardiographs, took blood oxygen readings, collected their exhalations for analysis and drew their blood for blood chemistries, he said.

One of his major findings: A crucifixion victim with arms outstretched can breath fine, he said. Indeed, many volunteers tended to hyperventilate with stress, at least at first, he said.

Moreover, even muscular young men could not collect Zugibe's incentive of $100 to push themselves up on his cross. With legs bent, they can't develop the necessary leverage, he said.

The ancient literature reveals many variations on crucifixion, Zugibe said: crosses of various shapes, with or without small saddles to extend a pinioned victim's misery. Victims nailed with or without supplemental ropes. Feet nailed to the face of the upright, or sometimes through the heels to both sides of upright.

Romans knew nothing about forensic pathology, but were practiced executioners, Zugibe said. They knew what worked, and they could arrange to keep a crucified victim alive for days.


Convergence of injuries


Zugibe and the JAMA authors concur that Christ's relatively quick death was set up by his pre-execution ordeal, particularly the scourging.

The evangelists say nothing about its severity. It is treated almost offhandedly; only one devotes so much as a sentence to it.

But it was no doubt cruel. More to the point, impact injuries to the chest and back cause fluid to leak into the chest cavity, compressing lungs and leading to shock, Zugibe said.

However, he believes Mel Gibson's extended torture scene in "The Passion of the Christ" was far over the top.

"I've had plenty of cases as a medical examiner where people beaten way less than that died of colla