“Faith never knows where it is being led,
but it loves and knows the One who is leading.”

~ Oswald Chambers ~

The concept of faith is a fascinating one whether you are talking about it in general terms or within the context of belief in a higher power. You can’t reach out and grab it, roll it in the palm of your hand, examine it under a microscope. You can’t admit it into evidence in a court of law, design an attractive container for it and sell it on the Internet or wear it like the latest fashion design.

So how do we know that faith even exists?

The most effective way to prove the existence and power of faith is by example and illustration. For instance, examples of times when spiritual people did not permit themselves to be guided by their faith stand in contrast to success attained because of reliance upon faith.

More powerful still can be the story of a life lived devoid of faith, as in Mitch Albom’s interview, published in the Lodi News-Sentinel with Dr. Death himself, Jack Kevorkian:

It’s hard to warm up to Dr. Death By his own estimate, Kevorkian, who was just released, helped at least 130 people die by hooking them to machines that would deliver lethal drugs or gasses, then allowing them to, essentially, throw their own switch.By Mitch Albom

He wore a pale blue suit over his small, thin body, and the skin on his face seemed pulled so tight his eyes bulged. Those eyes lock on you when you disagree with him. He may be 79. But after eight years in jail, Jack Kevorkian still was ready for a fight.

And he is not sorry.

“If I were sorry, I’d be a hypocrite,” he said.

He became the focal point of a person’s right to die. He flouted the law because he felt it unjust. He went to jail on a second-degree murder charge, after injecting poison into a patient. “I wanted the imprisonment,” he told me. He wanted to change the rules.

So far, the rules are still mostly there (except in Oregon). Americans are split on the idea of physician-assisted suicide. A recent Associated Press poll showed 48 percent approved the idea, while 44 percent did not.

But having known or met many people with terminal illnesses, I understand why human beings want the right to say, for themselves, enough suffering is enough.

So when Kevorkian sat down across from me, I was ready to empathize with his compassion for the sick.

I was not ready for the man himself.

Are you at all religious? I asked him.

“Religion is all bunk. . . . If you’re really religious, you can’t think for yourself.”

Would you call yourself an atheist? “Agnostic.”

What do you think happens when we die?

“You stink. You rot and stink.”

No soul? He laughed. “What’s a soul?”

How did you feel the first time you watched someone die by your machine, a 54-year-old woman who had Alzheimer’s?

“Relieved. For her sake and mine.”

Did you feel you crossed a line?

“I had the honor of having reached a status in the practice of medicine that would have pleased Hippocrates.”

But doesn’t the Hippocratic oath call for doing anything required to help the sick?

“Of course. But that’s not my job. It’s her clinician’s job. They gave up.”

But isn’t there a big difference between saying something is untreatable and helping someone die?

His voice rose in pitch. “I’m not gonna help you die – I’m gonna end your suffering!”

At that moment, with his face contorted in the disgust of someone challenging him, I couldn’t imagine a suffering so bad that I would want Kevorkian to be the last person I’d see on Earth.

Kevorkian debated familiar charges: that he didn’t always have thorough medical information on the patients he helped die (”If the doctors would have talked to me, it would have made it easier. Blame them”); that he didn’t do enough to dissuade suicidal thoughts. (”I turned away four or five for every one I helped.”)

As we spoke, I heard intelligence, self-assurance, even arrogance. What I didn’t hear was humanity. He didn’t seem to think much of the human race. He likened life to “a tragedy.” He quoted famous people saying they wouldn’t bring babies into this world.

When I said that would wipe out mankind, he said, “What’s wrong with that?”

Jack Kevorkian is a man who never had a family, a man for whom the world is bleak, happiness is rare, belief is a waste of time and life is a finite, meaningless entity. The act he champions may indeed be one of compassion, but how can it be delivered by such a cold, cold heart?

I know all too well what it is like to wish for your loved one’s suffering to end and be relieved when it finally does. But there are loving, kind, morally appropriate ways to ease your loved one — and yourself — through the process of dying and Kevorkian chose to ignore them. It comes as no surprise then that he is a man devoid of faith, utterly lacking the joy that hope brings each morning.

As I was reading that interview, I kept hearing this verse in my head: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy; But I tell you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, To show that you are the children of your Father who is in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the wicked and on the good, and makes the rain fall upon the upright and the wrongdoers.” (Matthew 5:43-45)

We are commanded to pray for people like Kevorkian who are obviously lost and have no faith or hope. We are also admonished to hold up our fellow believers in prayer since we all get lost from time to time until our faith and hope return to them and/or show us the right path. In this particular instance, we should also pray for the families of Kevorkian’s victims, asking that they be given understanding, peace and serenity in the face of the evil he perpetrated upon their loved ones.

In "other" Words

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Since I first saw the quote for this week’s writing exercise, one of my all-time favorite Bible passages has permeated my thoughts:

The word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”"Ah, Sovereign Lord,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am only a child.”

But the Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the Lord.

Then the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “Now, I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.”

Jeremiah 1:4-10

There are no accidents. There are no coincidences. Not one single person is living on this planet at this moment in time who wasn’t placed here as part of God’s plan. Each of us has a specific purpose, a particular path we are meant to walk, neither of which is necessarily easy to discern. We each have something to say, whether we do it verbally, via prose, poetry, musically, theatrically . . . We have each come into this world according to that plan for our life . . . and should leave it in the same way.

We are all equal. We are all worthy.

We are all modern-day Jeremiahs.

If you stop for a moment and ponder that thought, you will find it amazing, astounding and, perhaps, a bit overwhelming. Jeremiah did. Consider his response when the Lord told him that he was placed here in accordance with that plan. “I’m just a child! You want me to be a prophet? Are you kidding? What will I say? How? To whom?”

But the Lord was having none of it. Jeremiah was here for a reason, a purpose, and there was no way he could escape.

I know from personal experience what it means to be like Jeremiah, as I’ve shared in my previous entries in this series. I have had first-hand experience with that feeling of “I can’t” and having God show me in no uncertain terms that he isn’t accepting my lame excuses, my cop-outs. Bluntly, I have been kicked in the hind quarter by the Holy Spirit more than once.

Along with the responsibility to be obedient when we realize that we have been called to a specific task or to achieve a particular goal, is the confidence that we will not be abandoned or left to our own inadequate devices. We must say what the Lord commands us to say, knowing that he will “rescue” us when we falter. In fact, the Lord told Jeremiah that he put the words in his mouth, so he had better get busy. He provided him with the tools and equipment he needed to get the job done.

It is time to share an experience that I had while arguing a dispositive motion in the trial court related to Conservatorship of Wendland. It was a “Jeremiah moment” that I shall never forget and the combination of this week’s quote and the persistent reappearance in my conscious thoughts of the above-quoted Scripture compels me to the conclusion that now is the time to write about it.

I was not feeling particularly eloquent that day. I was tired from the long trial that seemed destined never to end. And I was not looking forward to having to engage in the oral argument that lay ahead of me, but I knew that I had to get through it somehow. By then, I knew that I had surely been called to handle the case.

So the time came and I launched into my planned oral argument. But after a few moments, I realized that I was no longer speaking.

Oh, my lips were moving and words were coming out of my mouth. But I wasn’t putting them there. It was quite literally like going into an arcade and turning the steering wheel on one of those race car games before you put the quarter in: There is an image of a car careening around the track, but no matter which direction you turn the steering wheel, the vehicle does not respond to your commands.

What was really interesting about this experience was that I did not become fearful or panic. When I realized what was happening — the Holy Spirit was speaking through me and it felt like an out-of-body experience — I was very calm and had a great feeling of peace. After all, I had no choice, but to simply “go with it” until such time as the Spirit had said what it needed the judge to hear.

And the judge was looking at me intently throughout the argument. I have never had an opportunity to talk to him about this, but I know that he is a Christian and I have always believe that on some level — probably unconscious — he knew who was speaking to him that day in the courtroom. He never looked away from me, never shifted in his seat, never cleared his throat, . . . he sat focused on my words alone until I finished speaking. Other than the sound of my voice, there was absolute silence in that courtroom.

One of my then-pastors was there that day, immersed in prayer as I argued. Leaving the courtroom, I told him, “You have to hear what just happened to me.” He smiled knowingly and assured me that he had, from time to time, experienced while preaching the exact phenomenon I described to him.

When I feel discouraged, frustrated or in search of meaning or context in my various activities, I think back to that day in the courtroom and that tangible manifestation of the Lord’s steadfast guidance. I think of Jeremiah and how he was purposefully called to speak, to proclaim.

My worth, like Jeremiah’s — and every other person’s — was determined by the fact of my birth and the path laid before me. In order to live up to our birthright, we must come to an understanding and appreciation of our calling, our destiny. Acknowledgment of and thanksgiving for the fact that we will be delivered from our own humanity empowers us to live in accordance with the Lord’s plan and speak with conviction, integrity and validity.

If we are faithful, our words can indeed bring kindness, comfort and yes, even holiness into someone else’s life.

Conservatorship of Wendland, In "other" Words, Pro-Life Blog Carnival, The Cost of the Call

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• January 23, 1973: A Day That Lives in Infamy

To outside observers, it probably looked like a crush. Typical high school puppy love. But for me, this business of a first big crush or “first love” is a complicated, thorny topic that I have scrupulously avoided blogging about until now. Oh, I’ve been writing the post in my head for a couple of years. But committing it to cyber-paper has been another matter. If I tell the story effectively, you will understand why.

We’ve all been through it to one degree or another. Innumerable songs, books, poems, paintings, drawings, and other forms of artistic expression have focused on our elusive desire to explain, analyze and recapture that feeling of first love.What did we learn from it, we ask ourselves later? Am I a better person for having experienced it? What would have happened if things had worked out for me and _____? We’ve all pondered the answers to those questions. Everyone thinks about their first love from time to time.

And what if that first love was not reciprocated? What if the initial crush never advances from longing to reality? What is the impact upon the person who experienced that early heartbreak? How are their later relationships affected?

In song, Garth Brooks proclaimed that “God’s greatest gift” is unanswered prayer, telling the story of a man who encounters a former girlfriend and thanks God that things did not work out for them, but, rather, he ended up with his wife. Like that man, sometimes we don’t really appreciate the impact of that first big crush or love on our life until many years later.

So it was with me. I spent a lot of years wondering “Why?” And when the answer was finally revealed to me by the Holy Spirit, I realized that Garth Brooks was, to some degree, right.I say “to some degree” because I do not believe in unanswered prayer. All prayers are answered. We just don’t always get the answer that we want.

I was a sophomore in high school when I met the first big crush of my life. From my perspective now, especially having raised two boys, I know that we were just babies. I laugh in the way that age allows, thinking back to the nights spent writing in my diary, thinking about him and wishing he would call, talking to my girlfriends about him instead, planning what I would wear to school the next day, how I would happen upon him, and what I would say. So much energy focused on another human being! I wish I could have some of it back to devote to my current interests and projects.

Those cliched songs, poems, sonnets, novels, etc. about first love all talk about it being unique and utterly incapable of repetition. Cliches are truisms, of course, and my experience was no exception. When I fell for him, I fell to the bottom of an empty well, landed on my head, suffered a major concussion, and did not regain full functioning for many, many years. Maybe I never did. Sometimes I still wonder.

This was no minor crush. No, this was big love. Boundless. Unconditional. Forgiving. Pure. I was completely naive, inexperienced, and unprepared because I was not one of the pretty, petite girls. I was always the sort of chubby, smart kid who was musical. That was my niche. I had friends — the same people I hang out with today — but I was not part of the “in” crowd, the “beautiful people”.

As you have probably guessed by now, my feelings were not returned. Instead, my first big crush had his first big crush on one of the other girls in my class. She insisted she did not feel “that way” about him, would never “do that to me” because I was her friend, etc. She also claimed that he repeatedly declared his unrequited love for her. At the time, being the neophyte that I was, I did not know that I had reason not to believe her.

So we spent three years in high school as part of a rather pathetic triangle that everyone in school knew about. Because I was so hopelessly and publicly smitten with the guy, no other boy would have come near me had they been interested (which I have no reason to believe they were). In those days, you didn’t go to the prom or other dances as part of a big group the way kids do now. You had to have a date. So I never went to any of those events.

After we graduated from high school, we went on to college. My girlfriend dropped out fairly quickly and got married young.

And what of my high school crush? Since he was only 13 days younger but a class behind me in school, he enrolled in the same college after I had been there for a year.

But what a difference a year makes. During that first year, I no longer saw him every single day. I was on a campus many times larger than our high school where I gained a lot of new friends in the music and drama departments. I also gained a lot of confidence and self-esteem that I lacked in high school where he reminded me daily that I was neither pretty nor popular enough for him to have a crush on me. (In my senior year, our A Cappella Choir performed a musical play entitled “Rough ‘n’ Ready. I was cast as “Rosie Pickens,” a rather unfortunate character name since it gave him an opportunity to repeatedly and cruelly call me “Slim Pickens.” I wonder sometimes if now, after having raised children of his own, he regrets that.)

I actively worked to forget about him. Yes, I had wanted to marry him, have his children and live happily ever after. But I came to accept that was not to be.

Which brings me to the question quoted above. It was the spring of my second year in college. By then, I was feeling pretty good about myself. I didn’t have a steady boyfriend, but I didn’t want one. I was focused on my education, planning to transfer to a four-year university that fall. I was busy all day every day with a full load of classes, musical pursuits, and one college or community theater production after another. I had been taking dance classes and was in what was probably the best shape of my life.

My high school crush was working for his family’s business and I saw him from time to time. One night he came by the community theater where I was stage-managing a production and, after rehearsal, we went for a drive. He stopped the car and we talked for a bit. I was not feeling particularly attractive or desirable because it had been a very long day and I was tired. I recall that I was wearing a red bandana (because I hadn’t felt like washing my long hair that morning), with my four-pocket jeans from the surplus store that were our uniform in those days.

And that was when he asked the question. Out of the blue. With no warning. I can no longer remember what words immediately preceded it, but I can still hear his voice.

“Am I too late?”

It seemed like forever, but, in reality, the pause could only have lasted a millisecond. I remember formulating the words, “For what?” But they would not come out of my mouth and I could not look at him. It was like an out-of-body experience where I was an observer, not a participant, in the conversation. It was literally as though something or someone had taken control of my body and my will like in the old “Outer Limits” television series introduction (”We have taken control of your television . . . “).

And as though from far, far away, I heard my own voice. I said, . . .

“Yes.”

Click here to read the rest of the story . . .

Conservatorship of Wendland, Pro-Life Blog Carnival, The Cost of the Call

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34 Years of Roe

By Ken Connor

Monday, January 29, 2007

Every year since 1973, millions of Americans have paused to remember the day when new words entered the American vocabulary. Words fraught with ambiguity, like “the right of personal privacy”. Euphemisms, like “terminate one’s pregnancy.” Obscure phrases, like “the penumbras of the Bill of Rights.” January after January we take time to remember these words, and the carnage they have caused.

In an act of breathtaking judicial arrogance, the Supreme Court of the United States on January 23, 1973, “discovered” a right to abortion in the Constitution which had, theretofore, been overlooked by lawyers, judges and scholars for almost 200 years. As a consequence of the court’s ruling, over 47 million unborn children have perished at the hands of abortionists in this country. Thousands of women have suffered physical and emotional injury. The entire culture has been poisoned by the rise of a “disposable man” ethic that jeopardizes the elderly, infirm, and handicapped persons with disabilities. That ethic has given rise to a spirit of utilitarianism that undergirds a ghoulish form of medical “research” that requires the destruction of human embryos for the “greater good.” No single decision in American jurisprudence has resulted in more damage to the American people than Roe v. Wade.

In addition to its social implications, the Roe decision has had profound political implications. The opinion effectively amended the U. S. Constitution without going through the amendatory process. Amendments to the Constitution are not a bad thing. We have had a number of them in the 200 plus years that our Constitution has been in existence. Anticipating the need for modification to the document over time, our forefathers created a democratic process for amendment when large numbers of the American people felt change was in order.

Article V of the Constitution sets out the process by which an amendment is added to the Constitution. Two methods may be employed: one originating in Congress, the other originating in state legislatures. In Roe, however, these procedures were completely short-circuited. Rather than following the prescribed process, the Court aborted it, twisting the words of the Constitution to mean that which they did not.

We are on profoundly dangerous ground when America allows Judges to rewrite the Constitution through the process of interpretation. A passage from Lewis Carroll’s book, “Through the Looking-Glass, And What Alice Found There,” comes to mind:

“When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less,” said Humpty Dumpty. “The question is,” replied Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is,” replied Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master — that’s all.”

Since Roe, a number of judges on the Supreme Court (as well as judges of other inferior courts) have operated with a Humpty Dumpty mentality, considering themselves the “masters” of words. These judges view the words of the Constitution as no longer having objective, propositional meaning. They are mere wax which can be molded and shaped to mean whatever the judges want them to mean. Judicial activism, however, leads to the end of the democratic process. If the document itself is infinitely flexible, if the written words do not have objective meaning, if they are to be interpreted only in light of the subjective whims of judges, then there is no point in having a Constitution at all. Thomas Jefferson understood this when he declared, “Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction.”

Mr. Jefferson knew that there was security in having a written Constitution, a written document that could be easily referenced in a dispute. Notwithstanding that, he foresaw that some individuals would try to render the document meaningless by interpreting it in absurd ways. His fears have been realized. Judicial activists have done enormous damage to our constitutional form of government by embracing relativism and the concept of “deconstruction”, which maintains that the meaning of a text is fluid and culturally bound. Advocates of the so-called “living” Constitution argue that the meaning of the Constitution is different today than it was in 1787, and it may change again tomorrow . . . depending on how Supreme Court justices read it.

If judges are given the ability to change the meaning of the text by making the words their servants, they will become the masters, not just of the words, but of the American people as well. If judges are to have the final say as to all things constitutional, if they can make the words mean whatever they choose them to mean—then the American people will have ceded ultimate authority to that single branch of government. The United States of America will no longer be a constitutional republic. It will be nothing more than a judicial oligarchy.

The fight against Roe, therefore, is more than a fight for the lives of the unborn. It is also a fight for the survival of our constitutional republic. Our forefathers bled and died to give us a republic. We should not let a small group of judicial activists steal it from us.

Ken Connor is Chairman of the Center for a Just Society in Washington, DC and a nationally recognized trial lawyer who represented Governor Jeb Bush in the Terri Schiavo case.

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I was reminded tonight, as I watched the services for President Gerald Ford and caught a few moments of Ben Stein’s appearance on The O’Reilly Factor, about the evening that I spent with him.

Most people know Ben from “Win Ben Stein’s Money” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.” Lesser known is the fact that Ben worked as a speech writer for Presidents Nixon and Ford, and is a conservative political commentator. He is also a life advocate.

A few years ago, he was the keynote speaker at Life Legal Defense Foundation’s (LLDF) annual dinner. LLDF provided significant financial support to my clients during the Wendland case, paying some of the actual costs (court filing fees, printing, binding, and postage, etc.). I attended the group’s annual dinners (and still do when I can) where I provided updates on the status of the case, answered questions, etc.

I was delighted to meet Ben and, with my good friend, Wesley J. Smith, spent a good deal of time before dinner talking with him about the factual details of the Wendland case. He was fascinated and completely unaware of so many aspects of the then-pending proceeding. He asked insightful questions and was genuinely interested in the answers.

When he took the podium after dinner, he was rather disoriented. He told those in attendance that he had a speech planned, but was abandoning it, in light of his conversation with Wesley and me. He noted that he was completely appalled by what he had learned during our discussion, to the point that he could not simply forge ahead with his planned remarks.

Instead, his address was impromptu and focused on his reaction to the true facts of the Wendland matter. He was horrified, for instance, to learn that the campaign to kill Robert Wendland was waged in spite of his cognitive abilities — Robert was neither comatose, in a permanent vegetative state, nor terminally ill. He was shocked at my recitation of some of the tactics employed by those on the other side of the case, and had no idea about the case’s motivating forces until Wesley and I educated him.

It was only after he left for the airport that I was informed he had excused himself from the dinner table, reporting when he returned that he had, in fact, become physically ill as a result of what he had learned during our conversation.

He was so moved by the revelations that he made a donation to LLDF and serves to this day as a member of the LLDF Board of Advisers.

Leave it to BigBob to sum up the evening’s events so succinctly on the way home.

As we were driving along, still stunned by what had transpired, he turned to me and said, “Well, dear, now you have another claim to fame. Henceforth, you shall be known as ‘the woman who made Ben Stein puke.’”

And every time we see Ben on television, he reminds me of that moniker.

Ben Stein, Conservatorship of Wendland, Life Legal Defense Foundation, Pro-Life, Wesley J. Smith

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Bob and his wife, Mary, became my friends when we were called upon to speak publicly together about the then-pending legal struggles to save Terri in Florida and Robert Wendland here in California. Bob and Mary, like Florence Wendland, were devoted parents who only wanted to honor what they believed to be the wishes of their daughter, a devout Catholic who, they still insist, would never have chosen to die the way she ultimately did.

I will never forget the evening I spent with Bob and Mary at the 2005 Life Legal Defense Fund annual fundraising dinner where they spoke.¹ They were exhausted — mentally, physically, psychologically, emotionally, spiritually — but determined to forge on in an attempt to prevent other families from suffering the kind of tragic turmoil theirs did.

You can send good wishes, addressed as follows:

Robert Schindler
c/o The Terri Schiavo Foundation
562 Central Ave. # 2
St. Petersburg, FL 33707

Please keep Bob Schindler and the entire Schindler family in your prayers in the days ahead.

1. See Unremarkable Acts of Kindness, December 14, 2005.

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And, in my opinion, that sentence made about as much sense as did the remainder of their decision, which included a remand back to the trial court. In other words, a directive to go try the case again.

I remember reading that part and thinking, “Over my dead body. Literally.”

There was never anything hard about this case from a legal standpoint, especially after that day in the summer of 1995 when we (me, the managing partner at my firm, Rose Wendland’s then-counsel, W. Stephen Scott, and Judge McNatt) visited Robert at Lodi Memorial Hospital. Judge McNatt said that if he was going to render a decision about the man’s life, he wanted to see the man in person.

What was most striking about that visit were two moments in particular: The first was when we were waiting for the judge to arrive. We were discussing Robert’s abilities and Steve Scott mumbled something along the lines of “a monkey can do that.” I was repulsed.

The second was when we — the judge included — were standing in the hospital corridor watching Robert maneuver his wheelchair. He crashed into a linen cart. One of the aides started toward Robert, intent on assisting him. But the physical therapist stopped her. I’ll never forget what she said: “No. Let him problem-solve.” Sure enough, after a few moments, he figured out how to back up, change the direction of the wheels, and continue down the hall.

The significance was not lost on Judge McNatt, whose eyebrows flew up when he heard the word “problem-solve.” He watched Robert intently during that visit.

For me, it confirmed that this case was a legal “no-brainer” in terms of how the court should rule.

Which is probably part of the reason that the vociferous battle that seemed like it was never going to end was so taxing.

After the trial ended, Rose got a new attorney. He wasn’t new to the case, though. He was none other than Lawrence Nelson, who calls himself a “bioethicist.” He is a professor at Santa Clara University. During the trial, he served as an “expert” witness for her, but I had a great deal of fun skewering him on cross-examination.

It was particularly satisfying because I actually met Nelson well before the trial and under unusual circumstances. I had been informed of his participation in the case, but had never heard of him. Then one day I received an advertisement in the mail for an MCLE (Mandatory Continuing Legal Education) course offering in Sacramento. Among the topics was to be end-of-life decision-making and among the presenters? You guessed it: Nelson. So I immediately enrolled. I had never met him and he had never met me, so I figured I could sit in the back of the class, unobtrusively checking him out and taking notes on his commentary.

During the break, I was out in the hallway and walked right into my nemesis, Steve Scott. Foiled! I knew that he would tell Nelson I was there, if he hadn’t already.

Predictably, Nelson played to me after that, looking at me to punctuate the points he was making and plainly attempting to intimidate me with his self-acclaimed expertise.

And then the moment came. He was responding to a question from an audience member about how to get a feeding tube removed when the patient’s life should no longer be prolonged. He said the words that I will never, ever forget. Even as I sit here typing this, I can hear the faux authority in his voice and see the sneer that was on his face. He looked right at me as he said, “You want a feeding tube pulled? You call me. I’ll get it pulled.” And then there was a very pregnant pause, as he made sure I absorbed the meaning of his words before he moved on to take the next question.

He was just like a schoolyard bully who draws the line on the playground and dares the new kid to cross it.

And all I could think was, “Oh, buddy, you have no idea what you have just done.” Because I knew that there was no way I was going to allow his arrogance to get the better of me, my clients, or my case. I determined right there to make him regret ever uttering those words.

But back to the appeal in the Third District Court of Appeal . . .

The oral argument was unbelievable. Recognizing the seriousness of the case, the justices had doubled the amount of time normally allotted for oral argument. The media was assembled, as usual.

I was a moot court finalist at McGeorge School of Law, which means that I got a lot of invaluable training in the art of appellate argument. And one of the things that was stressed to me by my professors and coaches was this: If you are not prepared to step up to the podium with nothing in your hands, you are not prepared to argue your case. It is as simple as that. You must know the facts of your case, as well as the legal precedents which support and militate against your clients’ arguments, cold. The appellate court is not the place to stop and look up the name of a case, review its holding, or double-check the facts. Appellate argument is all about thinking on your feet and being flexible because appellate justices rapid-fire questions at you from all directions and they always interrupt you, so you cannot plan to give a speech. You come up with a one-sentence opener and hope you get through it (out of all the appellate arguments I’ve handled, I’ve never completed my opening sentence yet) before they stop you and ask a question that is, predictably, diametrically opposed to whatever aspect of the case you are thinking about at that moment.

So I watched with amusement as Nelson and James Braden entered the courtroom with boxes of books, binders, and files. (Braden had taken over representation of Robert from Doran “Oh, I’ve lost myself” Berg, the Stockton Public Defender appointed to represent his interests at trial.) They didn’t bother to check the docket, apparently, nor did they check in with the clerk of the court. They just went right up to counsel table and proceeded to unload their boxes. But there was an argument scheduled before ours, so the clerk had to come over and instruct them to pack it all up again.

Did I mention that Nelson and Braden graduated, respectively, from Yale and Harvard Schools of Law?

Braden appeared completely unversed in courtroom etiquette, refusing to yield to the justices on numerous occasions, attempting to talk over and interrupt them.

Finally, he was so out of control that Justice Arthur Scotland stopped the argument to lecture him on the rules.

“Mr. Braden, let me tell you how it works here. We get to interrupt you. You do not get to interrupt us.”

I’ve never seen anything like it. I dared not look at my gallery of supporters in the courtroom (whom I heard quietly snickering) or Braden, so I just continued studying the justices’ faces.

I was at my counsel table all by myself with just my yellow legal pad and a pen, jotting down key words as they spoke so that I would be ready for rebuttal. Just as I was making a note, I felt something fall into my hand. It was my gold chain with the heart and cross pendants. The clasp had come open. I couldn’t put it back on during the argument, so I figured I would just put it into the pocket of my jacket. There was just one small problem with that plan: I was wearing a brand new suit and had forgotten to cut open the pockets! So I just held the necklace in my left hand as I continued writing a word here or there with my right and then returned to the podium to be further grilled by the justices. I didn’t realize how tightly I was grasping it.

When the argument was over, I remembered the chain. When I opened my hand, I saw that I had clutched it so tightly during the argument that there was an imprint of the cross on my palm.

Happenstance?

Of course not.

To be continued . . .

Conservatorship of Wendland, The Cost of the Call

Related Articles

• Wendland in the Media
• Welcome
• Tribute to Florence Wendland
• The Cost of the Call (Part Two): Reflections in Conjunction with the Fifth Anniversary of the Wendland Victory
• The Cost of the Call (Part One): Reflections in Conjunction with the Fifth Anniversary of the Wendland Victory

Tomorrow is the fifth anniversary of the California Supreme Court’s decision in Conservatorship of Wendland.So how ironic is it that tonight of all nights I happened to run into the trial court judge, Bob W. McNatt?¹

I hadn’t seen him for a couple of years and must say that I was genuinely glad to encounter him. I would not describe Judge McNatt as a brilliant jurist, but he is a decent, honorable man who is committed to his work. Throughout the Wendland case, I knew that he was doing his very best to be thorough, accurate, and in compliance with the letter of the law. During the trial, he knew that any ruling he made would be appealed, and I always felt that he did his best to provide the parties with his rationale so that the appellate court would have a decent record to review when making its decision.

Both of us look a lot older now, as the pictures I have included here confirm.

We chatted for a few moments about our current work. And he reminded me that we are inextricably intertwined in the history books.

Both of us agreed that we could not do it again.

When you are in the midst of a great deal of stress, it is common not to realize the toll it is taking upon you and those around you. The situation must be dealt with. Contemplating how you are feeling about it frequently is a luxury you just don’t have time for until much later. You just put one foot in front of the other and deal with it. So it was for nearly the entire six years that I represented Florence Wendland and Rebekah Vinson. I had been handed the case by the managing partner at the firm. After I watched the videotape showing Robert responding to his physical therapists at Lodi Memorial Hospital, read his medical records up to that date, and looked at the state of the law as of that date (there was no legal precedent because the California courts had never heard or decided such a case), I knew that I had been thrust into something I was totally unprepared for.

I also knew it was a case I could not lose. The stakes were simply too high.

I didn’t have a clue how I was going to go about preparing for the trial, much less secure a victory for my clients. All I knew was that I could not let my clients down. Thankfully, at the beginning it seemed like only the folks living in the county in which the trial took place were watching. Then it was the entire state . . . eventually, the whole nation, and then the world. We were interviewed by the major daily newspaper in Tokyo and there were several major pieces done on the case by the London Times.

I came to realize — especially after I found myself the subject of artists’ renderings such as the one here depicting the first day of the October 1997 trial — that if I failed, I was going to fail in a major, headline-grabbing way. Robert Wendland would die and it would be my fault.

But I didn’t have the luxury of time to analyze my feelings. I just put one foot in front of the other. I spent many, many nights doing what I’m doing right now . . . surfing the ‘Net while watching television. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t stop thinking about the case, my clients, what was at stake. Potential legal strategies haunted me in the wee hours.

Ms. Clairol became my new best friend. “See these gray hairs? I owe 50% of them to Robert Wendland, and the other 50% to my kids and husband,” I would joke.

The realization that I had been called to handled the case came slowly, gradually. Only after the first few skirmishes did I see that this had been my case from its inception and my handling of it was preordained. I came to feel very much the way pastors and priests describe their sense of being “called” into the ministry.

Of course, I didn’t talk to anybody about it except for a couple of my closest Christian friends (Wesley J. Smith and Dana Cody) and my pastors, for fear people would think me either a bigger egomaniac than they already presume lawyers are — or a complete lunatic.

I certainly did not tell anyone that, for the entirety of those six years, I felt the weight of Robert Wendland’s very life on my shoulders. I carried it around as surely as if I had carried his physical body on my back. I lived day in and day out with the sure knowledge that if I abandoned my clients, Robert would die. No other lawyer was crazy enough to step into the battle that was raging and take over representation of my clients. No other lawyer was crazy enough to handle the case on his/her “own time,” i.e., after working 50 or 60 hours per week in a law firm on other cases — which is how I handled the appeals. No other lawyer wanted to be associated with the case — branded, as it were, a rabid “right-to-lifer,” as Ron Cranford called me and my clients from the witness stand as the other attorneys snickered at counsel table.

Nope, this baby was all mine.

So it came as no real shock when, on the second day of trial after the managing partner at my firm (who was supposed to be “lead counsel” at the trial) had completely botched his direct examination of Rose Wendland, my clients came to me and told me that they wanted me to be the lead counsel. They wanted him off the case, having lost any faith they once had in him. Instead of blowing up, as I feared he would when I told him, he was relieved. He practically skipped down the hallway, undoubtedly on his way home to enjoy a good stiff drink and celebrate his good fortune.

Proof yet again that this was my case and I had been called to litigate it.

The trial dragged on for weeks. Eventually, though, it occurred to me that Rose Wendland simply could not win because she had not carried the evidentiary burden earlier assigned to her by Judge McNatt. I floated the idea around the office. Nobody thought that bringing a motion to end the trial at that point was a winning strategy. But I did, so I stayed up all night writing the brief. We waited until the end of the day to argue the motion . . . the courthouse was closing up around us and the sun had long since set, but we remained in Judge McNatt’s courtroom arguing while the media camped out in the hallway waiting for word. I was praying that the motion would be granted, thereby bringing about the end of the trial — and eliminating any need for me to make the opening statement the managing partner had “deferred” (one of the dumbest trial strategies in the history of jurisprudence) or call a single witness to the stand.

I was told later that while I was in court arguing the motion, the partners at my law firm were back at the office laughing about my strategy — and at me for putting so much effort into it. They were utterly convinced it would not work.

But the Holy Spirit was in the courtroom that day. It assured my clients the victory. After all, I was called to handle this case and the Holy Spirit was not going to abandon me then — or at any time thereafter.

What I hadn’t yet realized — and would not come to fully comprehend or appreciate for a few more years — is that the Holy Spirit had been guiding me toward that moment for many, many years.((You can read my discussion of this is subsequent articles.))

Do I look exhausted in this photo? I should! That photo was snapped as my clients and I walked out of the courtroom, having just heard Judge McNatt’s ruling. My husband was there that day, so he got to hear the arguments and be there when my clients won. He was thrilled and extremely proud.

I remember that all I wanted to do was go home and tell my kids — who were 10 and 6 years old at the time — that the trial was over and yes, we could put the Christmas tree up that weekend. It was December 9, 1997. And there was going to be a Christmas at our house after all because Mama was not going to be in trial through the holidays.

To be continued . . .

1. The photo was taken in December 1997, as he was delivering his ruling — victory for my clients and the end of the Superior Court trial.

Conservatorship of Wendland, Pro-Life Blog Carnival, The Cost of the Call

Related Articles

• Wendland in the Media
• Welcome
• Tribute to Florence Wendland
• The Cost of the Call (Part One): Reflections in Conjunction with the Fifth Anniversary of the Wendland Victory
• The Cost of the Call (Part Four)

Angels provide us with many of our insights. We often call this inspiration or enlightenment, little realizing that we are actually taking the light of consciousness that they provide and calling it our own.

Ambika Wauters,
The Angelic Year

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