April 1, 2005

Pro-life supporters gather in Indianapolis
to pray for Terri Schiavo

By Mary Ann Wyand

People with disabilities shouldn’t be deprived of nutrition and hydration just because their minds or bodies don’t function perfectly, said two pro-life supporters who prayed for Terri Schiavo during a March 23 prayer service outside the Federal Court Building in Indianapolis.

Bishop Chatard High School junior Karolyn Curran, a member of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish in Carmel, Ind., in the Lafayette Diocese, said every person deserves to have food and water daily.

“I believe that even if people’s minds don’t function as well as everyone else’s that God still loves them,” Karolyn said after the prayer service, “and he still has a plan for them in his will.”

Karolyn said her family has “been praying the rosary for [Schiavo] every night at home.”

Robert Rust, who is a member of St. John Parish in Enochsburg, drove from Greensburg to Indianapolis to pray the rosary for Schiavo.

Rust said his faith, his belief in the sanctity and dignity of every person from conception until natural death, and his concern about the denial of Schiavo’s constitutional right to “her day in court” under the 14th Amendment motivated him to participate in the prayer service.

“One of the reasons I was there, in addition to praying for her,” he said, “was to have the outpouring as a witness that she wasn’t treated right constitutionally. She is an innocent and helpless human being who has been unjustly sentenced to death.” †

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