Just ask a professor of bioethics
And speaking of sanctimony, there’s nothing like letting a child die miserably while you pray over her instead of going to a doctor.
An 11-year-old girl died after her parents prayed for healing rather than seek medical help for a treatable form of diabetes, police said Tuesday…”She got sicker and sicker until she was dead,” [the police chief] said…[S]he had probably been ill for about 30 days, suffering symptoms like nausea, vomiting, excessive thirst, loss of appetite and weakness. The girl’s parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, attributed the death to “apparently they didn’t have enough faith,” the police chief said. They believed the key to healing “was it was better to keep praying. Call more people to help pray,” he said.
Which might be understandable if they lived on some other planet, but they lived in a town in Wisconsin, they owned a coffee shop, they had sent their daughter to school. They lived on planet earth and were not cut off from knowledge of what people do when they get sick. They were not cut off from available knowledge of what is the right thing to do when a powerless child gets sick.
But we are told we shouldn’t judge.
It’s important not to be moralistic or pass judgment on parents who think they can heal a child through prayer, said Dr. Norman Fost, professor of bioethics and pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin Medical School in Madison. “They believe they’re helping their child; they love their child, and they believe prayer has an effect,” Fost said.
How does he know they love their child? Does he know that? Is he just assuming it? Is he just thinking well all parents love their children so even parents who are delusional and reckless enough to let their children suffer and die for lack of medical treatment, must love their children? Probably. Which doesn’t give one much confidence in his powers of reasoning.
Yeah, OB, I read that article in B&W. It is so pathetic that a family like this (who by all accounts, are living/working in the modern world) should lower themselves to that extent for the sake of their supposedly looney religious beliefs – by placing on their vulnerable child a death sentence.
It is so absurd!
I wonder was Madeleine Neumann’s consent sought before ‘she got sicker and sicker and died’?
I doubt not!
“The mother believes the girl could still be resurrected, the police chief said.”
Such a crazy belief indeed! Pigs too, for that matter, could be flying about here and yonder. Chimera’s as well could already be alive and kicking; saying daily mass, and healing people.
Heaven help the good citizens of Wisconsin who have to drink their coffee is all I can say!
Bloody hell. I suppose they may have loved their daughter, but not nearly as much as they loved the warm feeling that not having to question their own beliefs gave them.
This girl was sacrificed: there’s no other word for it. They sacrificed their daughter’s life to their fake god.
I note that none of the 3 bioethicists interviewed have had formal eduction in philosophy. Two are physicians, and one is a lawyer. I’m not sure what that means, if anything, but it’s interesting.
They may have loved her to bits, and in a way I hope they did (I hope she had a good childhood apart from the last bit), but the ethicist sure as hell doesn’t know whether they did or not.
Interesting indeed about the training. Maybe they’ve read a pamphlet.
I wonder what will be done with these people. They are clearly unfit parents. The mother, at least, is also clearly mentally ill. Perhaps her insanity would have been detected sooner if it hadn’t taken the form of religious mania.
Where were the local churches when they heard (as they surely did, it took a month for this girl to die in agony after all) about this family’s crisis? Why did none of the local ministers or priests offer the advice they are offering now, when it is far too late? For that matter, what happened to the basic humanity of the other members of the “prayer group”? The school principal? Anybody?
The shameful thing is to see others who should know better fall over each other in their rush to how great “faith” is, before the victim’s body has barely cooled.
Hmm – I don’t know – I doubt the local churches did hear, and the prayer group probably thought just what the parents thought. That’s the thing about families: an awful lot can go on in complete secrecy.
Both of these loonies should be immediately arrested and charged with negligent homocide (at the very least) and their remaining children should be put in the care of the relatives who tried to save their sister. 25 years wouldn’t be nearly long for this pair.
Barney although burning in hell would be to good for these people, I doubt they will get more than a couple of years, this case will probably be dealt with with a plea bargain because the state in question will probably fear it will become some kind of first amendment case if it goes to trial.
I don’t really understand your last paragraph. Why would whether the parents’ love for their children be in doubt? Are you suggesting that being delusional prevents you from loving your children?
Too recklessly stupid to have children Owen. But then what’s new there ?
Speaking for myself (Ophelia is all too able to speak for herself!) I find it hard to believe that parents who watched their daughter die a slow and lingering death without so much as picking up the phone and dialling 911 are loving in any way I can understand.
Owen, it’s about epistemology, basically, though I suppose it’s also about begging the question. The professor of ethics is a stranger, he doesn’t know whether or not the parents loved the child, yet he simply asserted it as if he did know. Since he used that claim to back up his major claim, he was assuming what he was trying to prove; that’s a no-no.
All the evidence that’s available is the fact that the parents let the child die, therefore it’s absurd simply to assume that the parents loved the child (because, after all, they let her die, so obviously they loved her).
Perhaps the biggest absurdity here is that if, as parents, you acted in the same way, but claimed that you were hoping that [insert invented deity here] was going to cure your child, you probably would indeed have any remaining children taken into care.
Respect for religion is really a “might is right” argument combined with some sort of “argument from long-establishment”. If your adherents are few and your “faith” brand spanking new, the authorities will indeed treat you as unsuitable parents in such circumstances.
A commentor on Pharyngula made the sensible suggestion that if you are going to rely on faith to save your child you should first test your faith to make sure it is strong enough.
He suggested putting the barrel of a loaded gun in your mouth, asking god to protect you, and pulling the trigger.
If you balk at pulling the trigger, your faith is not strong enough. Call a medic.
If you blow the back of your head off, god has saved you from a bad decision.
If god stops the bullet, go ahead and pray.
For those of you who are interested, I have just come across an article entitled “The Death of Children by Faith-Based Medical Neglect.” (Journal of Law and Religion, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2004-2005) 247-265. According to this article, in “one study, between 1975 and 1995, an estimated one hundre seventy-two (172) children died after their parents rejected medical care on religious grounds. Of these children one hundred forty (140) suffered conditions for which suvival rates exceeded ninety percent, if there had been timely medical examination….”
This is obviously not an isolated phenomenon.
Don, as sensible as this suggestion is, the Bible-bashers are well and immunized from it. When Jesus says to Satan, “thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Matthew 4:6-7 and Luke 4:9-12), he is not saying, “I am God, you shall not tempt me, now begone!” He is saying, “I will not fling myself off this cliff and expect God to save me, because it is written that you mustn’t do that.” (Deut. 6:16)
“Tempt” is used here with an archaic meaning of “test”, rather than “entice.”
Ray – That’s very interesting; I didn’t know that. But then – if Don’s suggestion is subject to the rule, why isn’t refusing medical treatment subject to the same rule? Refusing medical treatment seems very like refusing to throw yourself off a cliff. I take it you’re familiar with the reasoning, so perhaps you know how that works!
Ray is quite right, and I thought about that when I read Don’s note, but the point that Don was making was just too good! The difference between throwing yourself off a cliff or eating a bullet and praying for a sick child is that even the Bible (look at the letter of James) says that we should pray for the sick, and call the elders in to anoint the sick, and the sick will be healed.
You mustn’t test God by doing something dramatic, just for show, but God is expected to heal, and if he can’t, then, well, nobody can! Of course, that was long ago and far away, when remedies for practically anything were pretty speculative and often made things worse. But if people can disbelieve in evolution for religious reasons, rejecting scientific medicine isn’t a very big step.
That makes sense. (As an explanation, I mean!)
Actually, it suggests a possibility that people with such beliefs could be talked out of them with ‘thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God’ – they could be told that now that we have scientific medicine, ignoring it is exactly like throwing yourself off a cliff and hence tempting the Lord. Really – somebody should try it. The Mission to the Witnesses or something.
OB,
Good point, and one which the “God helps those who help themselves” school of supernaturalism is quite keen on…
c.f. the old ‘morality joke’ about the guy stranded during a flood, who refuses all offers of rescue because he believes he’s such a good person, and his faith is so strong, that God is bound to save him. Of course, he drowns, and when he gets to heaven asks God why he didn’t save him, and God replies “But I sent you a canoe / boat / helicopter, etc,etc”
(never said it was funny)
It’s used a lot by the “cherry-picking” theology brigade when confronted by “But God didn’t cure me, it was modern scientific medicine”-type statements, and they condescendingly respond “ah, but who do you think it was gave the scientists a nudge in the right direction that enabled them to discover that cure, hmmm?”
The sort of thing that really sets my teeth on edge. Happens a lot when listening to TFTD on radio 4…strange, dat. :-)
When all realistic hope is gone, I’d be the last to decry the solace of prayer. Well, not quite the last, but you know…
But with a 90%+ chance of medical recovery, to choose prayer only is to tempt god exactly as Ray described. The arrogance is breathtaking.
They should be treated as the law treats snake-handlers – who throw a rattler into a crib.
(I now dread learning that in certain states throwing a venomous critter into an infant’s crib is legal, as long as the Lord is invoked.)
A sillier version is the man who berates God for not giving him a lottery win in spite of his fervent prayers. A black cloud forms over his head and a booming voice says “Meet me half way – buy a ticket!”
I think they are funny, both of them. Not new, but funny (and I have a crap memory, so I need jokes to be recycled).