Encyclical Foresaw Cases Like Terri Schiavo's

Unless U.S. justice steps in to save her, Terri Schiavo's agony will coincide with the 10th anniversary of the encyclical "Evangelium Vitae," which warned of an encroaching "culture of death."

"The Schiavo case demonstrates that that document was prophetic," said Legionary of Christ Father Thomas Williams, dean of theology at the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University in Rome.

In "Evangelium Vitae" the Holy Father condemns euthanasia in the strongest terms.

"Taking into account these distinctions, in harmony with the Magisterium of my Predecessors," the Pope writes, "and in communion with the Bishops of the Catholic Church, I confirm that euthanasia is a grave violation of the law of God, since it is the deliberate and morally unacceptable killing of a human person. This doctrine is based upon the natural law and upon the written word of God, is transmitted by the Church's Tradition and taught by the Ordinary and universal Magisterium."

"Pope John Paul II encourages us to call things by their names," said Father Williams. "And euthanasia, regardless of the motives behind it, always means homicide: the deliberate elimination of an innocent human life."

The Pope writes in No. 66: "The choice of euthanasia becomes more serious when it takes the form of a murder committed by others on a person who has in no way requested it and who has never consented to it."

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