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Faith Healing Kills: Conservative Christian parents in Michigan who refused to get their dying daughter medical attention because of “religious reasons” now face 25 years to life in prison. Where do you draw the line with religious rights? Should the church that indoctrinated these people be held accountable? Faith healing, anti vaccine and mental abuse should be considered. [patheos.com]

rogueflyer 8 Feb 26
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38 comments (26 - 38)

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2

Where they violate the rights of others, and that child had the right to get proper medical help.

2

Holding them accountable is the only thing to do. If they get off because of their "faith" and religious beliefs does it mean that they can collect the life insurance on the dead child? If so, you would find so many more deaths where faith healing was allowed but nothing from medical science.

2

They should all be put in a mental institution, forever.

1

Tough call. To the person accepting those odd ball beliefs, they are not engaging in anything dangerous. So killing ones kids by withholding needed medical treatment while under the influence of a dangerours belief system is probably an ameliorating condition. Not entirely excusing, more like a DUI caused by medications than booze or recreational drugs. You still get a sentence, but it would be less than if deliberate intent was involved and it might include a program to make you more aware of the dangers of your belief system. But then again in the US the way we pander to religious and parenting freedom there probably woudn't be any attempt to deprogram. Pity.

Then again tobacco companies have to put a warning on cigarette packs and have been liable for deaths of smokers.

1

Who was it who said that if faith healing worked, every hospital would have a faith healing wing?

Don't know who originally had said that but I'm glad you just did.

1

I participated in a Yahoo discussion group of Creation vs. Evolution. The subject of killing in the name of God came up in one discussion. The response from one creationist was to claim that killing someone in the name of God was not immoral because God gave life and God could restore a life taken by God's command. I suppose most of us on the other side were kind of dumb founded by the comment. I suppose the same could be argued about a life taken for any reason by someone of any belief (or lack of) but I don't recall anyone making that argument. Of course, we have NO examples of someone being killed and God restoring their life. Plenty of opportunities have existed, but no one has ever come back to life.

In Vietnam, just before an operation, a Navy Chaplain told me "don't worry son, God is on our side". I was dumbfounded. I didn't want to be there in the first place and that he thought his god chooses sides in a civil war and decides who wins and who dies is crazy hypocritical dumb. I turned around and walked away.

@rogueflyer - Isn't the concept that "God is on your side" more or less the point of a God in religion? Choosing the right set of specific beliefs and rituals gives the believer a leg up on getting favors from God. Praying often enough and in the right way, attending enough religious meetings, paying enough in offerings or donating enough time to your religion, and modifying your behavior such as what you drink or smoke, who you have sex with and wehether you are married or not, etc. is what makes the believer "worthy" of having God pay attention to them and of granting them what they need or want.

1

I hope they both rot to death in jail. #FuckReligousIdiots

1

Crucify them!

1

If the feds don't bust rastafarian based churches for drug possesion they should have no basis for charging those parents with anything. We live in a country founded on the freedom to practice our religious beliefs as we see fit...even if it's no religion. For we who don't see things the same way they do it may be a hard pill to swallow. I think those parents have suffered enough. What purpose can years behind bars have on those folks now? Their child is dead.

Hmmm, A little different not getting busted for taking a toke than letting your child die from starvation and dehydration.

Oh goodie, another closet Christian, coming here to save us all from a fiery hell. Get lost...your kind aren't welcome here.

When your religious dogma affect the health, life, wellbeing of a child then you have no right to claim religious right. These parents deserve time behind bars their child deserved to live. Rastafarians have a joint is one thing if they allowed their children to die because they were smoking then they deserved to be charged.

How do you know those parents have suffered enough? Would they doi the same again? Would they put their superstitious beliefs before the life of a child for whom they have a responsibilaty?

The law should be there as a deterrent. The jail time and presumably any other kids took off of them, might deter other nutjobs from this kind of willful neglect

Nope, sorry. We have rights guaranteed by our constitution-- one of them being life. Religious beliefs DO NOT supersede our laws. If what you said were true, then anyone could do anything and claim religious freedom.

@Joanne They already are.

0

The answer depends on the age of the child and the child's own wishes. We have a system so screwy about things like that. 'Age of consent', for example, only seems to matter if it is related to sexual decisions. Where parents out of faith, ignorance or anything between are legally allowed to impose their will/s on a child leaves off and where the child's bodily sovereignty begins has yet toi be fully, let alone fairly defined. It also relates to when a child's intellectual sovereignty begins and becomes fully his or her own.

I think it ironic and darkly humorous that political factions that dominate advocacy of interfering in a parent's decision on what is best for their child and/or family, are the same ones that hold a woman's right to unilaterally decide the fate of her gestating child; even all the way up to and sometimes after partum.

There's isn't the only hypocrisy though, by any stretch. On the other side you have those claiming human life to be sacrosanct in all forms dominate advocates of 'capital punishment' and adventuresome wars. Then those on the other side calling themselves 'pro-choice' fight tooth and nail any efforts to enlighten young women about the biological implications of their choices and other possible alternatives to pregnancy termination. Uninformed personal choice is no choice at all for an individual. Back to the Right, Conservatives claim to champion less government and more personal responsibility. That is unless personal means what goes on within a woman's own uterus.

See? It is very screwy and more dark, comic irony is that NEITHER side is bright enough to understand what they are actually advocating because limits to their language and narrowness of 'indoctrinated' scope blind them to it. So, the merry-go-round on who gets to meddle in who's life goes round and round and round and round. Many people arguing the same tired, ignorant arguments and expecting a different outcome shows the stupidity of both.

It isn't about children's rights or women's rights in the broadest sense. Nobody is privileged to claim superior rights or value in an allegedly egalitarian system. It is about guarding and defining ALL human rights equitably and incrementally as development takes place; about protecting in the same spirit along the course of development based on incremental participation beyond family into open society and finally impinging on it with fully protected autonomy.

Theologies, as birthplaces of our social order, stand in the way of that happening. Until theologies and ideologies lose authority over how people live and make personal decisions, we're doomed to live in a dark age but with plenty of toys with which to amuse and exalt ourselves.

I'm only concerned with a child's right to survive their parent's irrational care.

0

Child Protective Services steps in when they have a report of a parent endangering a child's life. However, if I take the view that CPS should step in (which I want to say they should) it would have to be based on SECULAR/SCIENTIFIC realities. The last thing I'd want is for Christians to lobby the government to have CPS step in and say "you need stop treatment until after you have prayed about it!" And if Christians can attack reproductive rights based on their religious beliefs, then where is the ceiling or the floor on what they could change once they take a whiff of that power. So we have to consider these double edged swords until such time as Christians do not have the numbers in our democracy to control the rest of us. Until then, I don't want to control them either. If the result is loss of life it is sad and preventable but it is their responsibility to prevent it and they who must live with it.

The irony, to me, is that they're less worried about protecting children who are already alive than barely fertilized eggs that don't even know they're a person or have any identity yet.

0

[mlive.com]

Read the article. Listen to the call. Think.

They should not have been parents for many reasons.

0

There’s nothing “conservative“ about far-out religious cults. It would make as much sense to label them as “liberal”.

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