Marci Rae Beagley, center, and her husband, Jeffrey Dean Beagley, behind left, walk into the Clackamas County Courthouse courtroom of Judge Susie L. Norby for their arraignment. Photo by Randy L. Rasmussen/The Oregonian

An Oregon couple was convicted on criminally negligent homicide…..

The Oregon couple are believers in faith healing. So, when their 16 year old son  developed a urinary tract infection they had prayed instead of taking their son to the doctors for modern medicine to take care of the problem.  The son had a complication, he was  suffering from a serious kidney disease resulting from a constriction in his bladder that was present at birth. A catheter could have saved his life. An a side note they previously had lost their granddaughter due to pneumonia and a blood infection because their granddaughters parents had believed the same way

Here is the link to that article….http://www.wftv.com/family/22421602/detail.html

I am kind of split on this situation

On one hand…..

It is sad that the child had died from something that would have been preventable if only he would have be able to receive medical treatment. I mean I am sure the parents did not mean to kill their son but with the loss of their granddaughter you would have thought that they would have at least possibly reconsidered their stand on no modern medicine. A loss of a child is something that most of us want to prevent.

On the other hand….

It is their religious beliefs.  I may not agree with the way they do things. I mean if my children get sick, I’ll take them to the doctor. If they get really sick I would go to the hospital and for me prayer would be all part of the process It is just one of those situations where I feel if they start to ban and make laws against some religious beliefs, I don’t think it will be long till my religious beliefs will be infringed on.

Today its faith healing, tomorrow it will be your right to deny flu shots or certain vaccinations or it will be the rights of you to decide that treatment option best for your child.

I mean I know plenty of people who don’t  vaccinate or refuse blood transfusions because of religious beliefs. And they are good people, they just believe different things than I do. I would hate to see that their child die and they  get charged with criminally negligent homicide all because if they went against their beliefs they might have been viewed as been able to save them. Especially because I know they would not intend for their child die but they wanted to honor the ways of the god and belief system they believe in.


All in all I think it may be a slippery slope that they went down  when they charged these parents…a well intentioned slippery slope but a slippery slope none the less. But when it comes to whether this decision is for the best….my verdict is still out….Saving a life is precious …..the freedom of religion is priceless…and finding a balance is the great divide.

I guess someday we will find that balance…

The real question here is how far is too far? How far does a religion go till it becomes a crime?

What are your thoughts?
Should the parents be charged?

  


Tomorrow, I start night shift (5pm to 5 am). Am I looking forward to it?  Not really

As some of you may remember I worked night shift well over a year ago at my current company. They had closed it due to layoffs and lack of work. Lots more work had come in now (a good thing) and they asked for me to move to nights again. It is still up in the air for how long the minimum we are looking at is six months the maximum is stated as indefinitely. They are leaning more to the maximum

You would think my problem would be more to do with the fact that, the last time I was on night shift I has a slew of problems. But, actually I am OK with that end. Most of the problems were because of the person I was working with and this time around I have a different person to work with and I actually know that I don’t have much to worry about.

I guess, what really bothers me is the amount of time I get to spend with the children.  If I stay up in the morning I get to see them and hour or two before they go to school.  Before I go to work I will have like 10 to 20 min with them.  They are saying that they will have us work 6 days a week. So, I will have one day that I am home with them a week.

Another thing that bothers me a little is the fact that I don’t get to sleep in our bed when my wife sleeps…yeah at times I am a sap.

I know I could have said no……but

This is one of those times where as Casey’s character in John Steinbeck’s  “Grapes of Wrath  said “I know this - a man got to do what he got to do”

I know that I have got to provide some sort of stability for my children. I want to provide them with everything that they need and maybe, just maybe a little bit of what they want  and to do that I need to break my heart a little. I want to be able to look them in the eye and say I did the best I could for you.
 I need to sacrifice a little bit of the times of joy I could have with them  so they can have a brighter and bolder future.

In the end, tomorrow with be a brighter day because of the pain I feel today and that love in its purest form.