c. 1998 Religion News Service
Virginia Supreme Court OKs removal of feeding tube
(RNS) A day after a feeding tube was removed from a Virginia man believed to be in a persistent vegetative state, Gov. Jim Gilmore unsuccessfully appealed to Virginia’s highest court to help keep him alive.
With the emergency ruling by the Virginia Supreme Court Friday (Oct. 2), the legal battle over Hugh Finn’s right to die has come to an end. The court ruled that withholding nutrition from the 44-year-old man only allows the natural process of dying and is not a mercy killing, which would be against Virginia law.
Without the feeding tube, Finn will become dehydrated, go into a coma and die within a couple of weeks, said Dr. Robin Merlino, medical director at Annaburg Manor Nursing Home in Manassas. Finn has been at the home since 1996, the Associated Press reported.
The Supreme Court ruling came a day after a tube through which Finn had received water and food was removed. Finn’s wife, Michele, had requested that the tube be removed and waged a legal battle with relatives over her decision.
In his appeal, the governor disagreed with a lower-court ruling that taking out the feeding tube would not be euthanasia.”Assuming … that Hugh Finn is in a persistent vegetative state, he is nevertheless not dying,”Gilmore said in the appeal.”On the contrary, the manifest purpose and effect of denying him food and water is to initiate a dying process not previously present.” After the Supreme Court decision, the governor’s office said it would not pursue the case any longer.
Finn, a former television anchorman in Louisville, Ky., was involved in a serious auto accident in 1995 that ruptured his aorta and deprived his brain of oxygen. He was left unable to communicate, eat or care for himself.
Although relatives debated whether to remove the tube, his wife said he had told her he would never want to live under such circumstances.
dc Talk’s new album debuts at No. 4 on Billboard’s Top 200 Album Chart
(RNS) Christian rock group dc Talk’s new album”Supernatural”has debuted at No. 4 on Billboard’s Top 200 Album Chart, the highest debut for a Christian rock artist in the chart’s history.
In addition, the sale of 106,213 units of the album in the first week since its Sept. 22 release amounts to the most albums ever sold in Christian stores in that period of time.
The debut puts dc Talk members Toby McKeehan, Kevin Max and Michael Tait in the same category as popular acts such as Lauryn Hill, whose album is No. 1, N-Sync, which ranked second, and Kiss and Marilyn Manson, who ranked third and fifth, respectively, on Billboard’s Top 200.”This is definitely the biggest event yet in the history of dc Talk and ForeFront Records,”Dan R. Brock, president and CEO of ForeFront Records, said in a statement.
Since dc Talk signed with the Franklin, Tenn., company in 1989, it has received numerous honors, including three Grammy awards, a number of Dove awards, two platinum albums, one gold album and two gold videos. They also have an agreement for sales in the general marketplace with Virgin Reords, signed in 1996.
Theologian urges Pentecostals to embrace ecumenism
(RNS) A leading Latin American theologian has told Pentecostals meeting in Cuba they need to overcome their defensiveness about mainstream Christianity and become more ecumenical-minded.
Juan Sepulveda, a Chilean identified with the liberation theology movement, said Pentecostals need to return to their pan-denominational roots and”walk together in ecumenical hope”with non-Pentecostal churches.
Speaking at a Sept. 23-27 meeting of Latin American Pentecostals in Havana, Sepulveda said Pentecostalism’s origins were deeply ecumenical, the church-related Latin American and Caribbean Communications Agency reported.
Rejection by mainstream churches pushed Pentecostals _ whose modern roots date to the early 1900s and who believe in speaking in”tongues”and other”gifts of the Holy Spirit”_ to distance themselves from other Christians and form their own denominations, Sepulveda said.”Other churches were not willing to appreciate the positive aspects and the renewal that marked Pentecostal movements,”Sepulveda said.”Everything was rejected, condemned and ridiculed (by mainstream churches) and in many cases the Pentecostal experience was described as the work of the devil.” Eventually, he continued, Pentecostals distanced themselves from other Christian movements, which they often came to regard as”mere human institutions.” Pentecostalism today is acknowledged as one of Christianity’s fastest growing movements.
Leading rabbi denied visa renewal in Uzbekistan
(RNS) Uzbekistan, which recently enacted stringent controls on religious expression, has refused to renew the visa of an American rabbi who serves as head of the Jewish community in Tashkent, the nation’s capital.
Rabbi Abba David Gurevitch, who was born in Russia but carries an American passport and has worked in Uzbekistan since 1990, had his visa renewal application rejected in September. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency news service said Friday (Oct. 2) that the Uzbek Foreign Ministry declined to give a reason for the decision.
Uzbekistan is a mostly Muslim, former Soviet republic in central Asia with about 30,000 Jews. Gurevitch, a Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic Jew, had been key in the revival of Jewish life in Uzbekistan since the breakup of the Soviet Union.
In August, a new law took effect in Uzbekistan that made it illegal for anyone except a government-certified member of the clergy to talk about religion one-on-one.
The law also made illegal all existing religious organizations that failed to re-register with the government. The groups were given just six weeks to complete the extensive paperwork required to re-register.
The government said the law was aimed primarily at stopping the spread of fundamentalist Islam.
However, authorities also have prevented Gurevitch’s Tashkent-based Jewish Education Center of Central Asia from re-registering, claiming it does not meet the new legal requirement of having members in eight Uzbek regions. The center has complained that Jews only live in six of Uzbekistan’s regions.
Lawyers for teen charged in prayer circle killings seek to change pleas
(RNS) Attorneys for the teen-ager accused of killing three classmates meeting in a prayer circle at a Paducah, Ky., school, have asked to change his pleas from innocent to guilty but mentally ill.
Lawyers for Michael Carneal filed a motion in McCracken Circuit Court Wednesday (Sept. 30) requesting that Judge Jeff Hines accept the pleas. The motion seeks a hearing on Monday (Oct. 5), before jury selection in the trial begins, the Associated Press reported.
Carneal, 15, is charged with three counts of murder and five counts of attempted murder in connection with his Dec. 1 shooting of Heath High School students.
In part, the motion says he”is guilty of the above offenses, that he has admitted that he is guilty of the above offenses, and that he has never denied that he is guilty of the above offenses.” But the lawyers argued that Carneal is mentally ill and needs treatment during imprisonment, but did not”suffer from any severe mental conditions constituting insanity”at the time of the shootings.
The motion also says a trial, which is expected to take about 10 days, is not necessary and”would be unduly painful for the victims, their families and the community.”
Quote of the day: Brazilian lawyer Antonio Passos
(RNS)”Men’s swimming trunks are intimate clothing. There is no justification for using the image of Jesus Christ … on the backside of a human body.” _ Lawyer Antonio Passos, arguing in court on behalf of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in an effort to ban the sale of a men’s swimsuit with a picture of Jesus on the seat as reported Thursday (Oct. 1) by the Associated Press.
IR END RNS
