The boy upon whose life the movie Lorenzo’s Oil was based died, aged 30. “On May 29, the family of Lorenzo Odone celebrated his 30th birthday. He died the next day. He had lived 22 years longer than doctors predicted when they diagnosed him – at the age of six – with an incurable, degenerative disease of the nervous system. His continued survival was attributed to an oil which his parents, Augusto and Michaela, had invented.” Their home, which ought by rights to have been a depressing place, was instead a shrine to love.
In the kitchen, still stuck to the fridge, are precise instructions in English and Spanish for his carers. Another list provides contact details of his six doctors. In the living room, above the day bed where he received physical therapy, is a diagram showing the correct positioning of the pillows and rollers to support him. During all his years of illness, he never developed a single bedsore and, until his death, had never suffered from pneumonia, which is common among ALD patients. …
“The main thing now is that Lorenzo is with his mother. My goal is for him to live on. I made a promise to him that other children would know his story and about his life before he became ill. I will honour that promise.”
Maybe Edith Piaf understood. We find and we lose. And are the better for it.
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Bravo.
In an age when medical treatment can keep a frail person going for a long time, one has to keep asking how much care is the right amount. Resistance to the culture of death must, in a sense, balance with development of a positive culture of death.
When the inevitable scarcity of health resources hits, there will be a big differnece between the government saying “We won’t pay for any more treatment” and a dying person welcoming, following St. Francis, Sister Death.
A revival of the “ars moriendi” (the art of dying) would be useful, but I wouldn’t give you good odds on it happening
The Odone’s lived an incredibly difficult life, with such a badly damaged boy who needed so much care.
They could have killed him, of course, by the simple expedient of the withdrawal of care. It’s legal. Sons and daughters do it to elderly parents all the time; it’s the way we’re going to take care of our Alzheimer’s problem with the Baby Boomers. There will be no problem. Once the official designation of Alzheimer’s is made, the individual will no longer have any say over their care. Once the inevitable physical failure begins that individual will die. Over time this methodology that will grow efficient. “It’s better that way, don’t cha know? She’s at peace now.”
The Odone’s could have done the same with their boy, but since they loved him they knew they would have been killing him. Fate gave them a decision. They chose love, and an incredibly hard life, over convenience. In my opinion this was a better life than the easy one they could have had. Fate’s tough sometimes.
Note: How a mentally competent individual responds to the inevitable loss of the loveliness of life is a separate matter. It’s third party decisions as to who lives or who dies that threaten a moral corruption. There’s always a good reason for a dead body.
This is what we in the west do best..those of the left who decry our culture and our advancements would do well to remember this family.
Psalm 42 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
[NIV at IBS] [International Bible Society] [NIV at Zondervan] [Zondervan]
Psalm 42
BOOK II : Psalms 42-72
1
For the director of music. A maskil of the Sons of Korah. [a]
[b] As the deer pants for streams of water,
so my soul pants for you, O God.
2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God?
3 My tears have been my food
day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
4 These things I remember
as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go with the multitude,
leading the procession to the house of God,
with shouts of joy and thanksgiving
among the festive throng.
5 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and 6 my God.
My [c] soul is downcast within me;
therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
7 Deep calls to deep
in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
have swept over me.
8 By day the LORD directs his love,
at night his song is with me—
a prayer to the God of my life.
9 I say to God my Rock,
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?”
10 My bones suffer mortal agony
as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
11 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.