Wesley J. Smith on Futile Care Theory on National Review Online

re: "...Near the end of his testimony, Bishop Aymond quoted the 1995 encyclical The Gospel of Life, in which John Paul II stated that in situations “when death is clearly imminent and inevitable, one can certainly in conscience refuse forms of treatment that would only secure precarious prolongation of life, so long as the normal care due to the sick person in similar cases is not interrupted.” But surely, John Paul II was referring to the right under Catholic moral teaching of patients and families to choose to forgo treatment — not the right of hospital ethics committee to impose such decisions upon the unwilling. / If patient autonomy is to retain any real meaning; if we are to prevent subjective and invidious quality-of-life value judgments from being imposed upon the sickest and most vulnerable among us — it is crucial that the Texas legislature kill the futile-care law’s 10-day rule once and for all. Unfortunately, the Texas bishops and Catholic Conference are impeding the success of this important work. In so doing, they are opening the door to the imposition of medical discrimination against those judged by strangers on ethics committees to have lives not worth living. Somehow, I don’t think this is what John Paul II had in mind."...