Experts say pope's speech on feeding tubes settles some key issues

Published: 2004-04-07

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope John Paul II's forceful defense of nutrition and hydration for patients in a persistent vegetative state has narrowed the margin of Catholic debate on the issue, according to church experts at the Vatican and in Rome. At the same time, the pope's speech left some key aspects of the question open to further reflection and interpretation, the experts said. One crucial point the pope himself acknowledged was that tube-feeding loses its purpose when the patient is no longer nourished by the process. Interviewed by Catholic News Service in Rome April 6-7, the experts agreed that the pope's comments marked a significant step in consolidation of the Catholic position on the nutrition and hydration issue. "I have no doubt that the implications of this statement will be considered extremely important, particularly in the more than 600 Catholic hospitals in the United States," said Redemptorist Father Brian Johnstone, a theologian in Rome who deals with bioethical issues. The pope's comments are authoritative, church officials said, although less so than if they had been expressed in an encyclical or other document.

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