1,500 attend vigil in St. Paul for Terri Schiavo

The Prayer Vigil for Terri held at the Cathedral of St. Paul Tuesday night, with only three days planning and two days notice to the Christian and pro-life networks (radio and e-mail), was attended by over a 1000 people!! Archbishop Harry Flynn led the vigil, with testimony by Franciscan Brother of Peace Conrad Richardson.

Br. Conrad speaks at the Cathedral's Prayer Vigil

From the Star Tribune (and, for the record, it was NOT a Mass, it was basically a Liturgy of the Word prefaced by a talk by Br. Conrad and the chanting of the Divine Mercy chaplet):

A night of prayer for Terri Schiavo drew about 1,500 people to the Cathedral of St. Paul on Tuesday night, hours after a federal judge refused to order that the Florida woman's feeding tube be reinserted.

The mass, which lasted about an hour, was followed by private meditation for some of the people who prayed for the overthrow of what Archbishop Harry Flynn called "the Roe versus Wade of the euthanasia movement."

"If Terri is allowed to starve to death by the order of the courts, it will open the floodgates to court-ordered euthanasia for other severely disabled and nonproductive persons," he said.

The mass was organized by the Franciscan Brothers of Peace, an order that has grown close to Schiavo's parents.

Three members of the order, the smallest within the Archdioese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, were in Florida on Tuesday with Schiavo's parents and siblings, according to Brother Conrad Richardson.

He delivered a personal message from Schiavo's mother to the worshipers at the cathedral:

"Words cannot express our gratitude for the many good people who are helping us fight to save our daughter," Mary Schindler wrote in the message. "God bless you."

The night was yet more evidence that the Schiavo court case has resonated deeply within the Catholic Church and its teachings on the sanctity of human life. Flynn, delivering the homily during Tuesday night's mass, compared two newspaper stories that he saw in Sunday's Miami Herald: One, on the front page, was about Schiavo. The other chronicled the court case of a man who stands accused of starving his animals to death after running out of money to feed them.

"Certainly I would be against such cruelty, but at the same time I would be against, in a very strong, strong way against the cruelty of starving a sister to death and depriving her of water," he said.

Schiavo, 41, is Catholic, according to her parents and siblings.

Flynn also quoted a statement from Pope John Paul on disability: "A person, even if seriously sick, or prevented from the exercise of a higher purpose, is and will always be, a person. He will never be a vegetable or an animal," Flynn said.

Schiavo's husband, Michael, has argued through his lawyer that his wife would not want to live in her current condition. U.S. Rep. Mark Kennedy, R-Minn., was among those who attended the mass.

Catholic Parents Online, a conservative Catholic lay group based in St. Paul that urge attendance at the mass, also sent a plea Tuesday for people to call and e-mail the White House on Terri Schiavo's behalf. "The line was busy a few times, but please persist!" the e-mail implored.

Source: 1,500 attend vigil in St. Paul for Terri Schiavo