Terri's Parents Hold Funeral

Speaking before some 800 mourners at a funeral Mass planned by her parents, Terri Schiavo's sister said the severely brain damaged woman showed the world perseverance and determination, as did her parents' supporters during the long court battle to keep her alive.

Suzanne Vitadamo, whose family fought to keep Schiavo's husband from removing her feeding tube so she could die, said Schiavo's smile brought them great joy and she missed her.

"You didn't want to give up but God called you home, and he loves you more than we do," Vitadamo said Tuesday. "I will forever be proud to tell anyone who will listen that I'm her sister."

The funeral was in some ways a rally for those who fought unsuccessfully to keep Terri Schiavo alive. Schiavo's married name was never spoken, reports Gordon Byrd of CBS radio affiliate WHNZ.

Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, sat in the front row of Most Holy Name of Jesus Catholic Church, joined by their two other grown children. Outside, mourners sat in folding chairs or stood as the service was relayed on loudspeakers.

"Those of us in the first row with the Schindlers were told it was a no-cry zone," said Franciscan Brother Paul O'Donnell.

In the homily, the Rev. Frank Pavone, national director of the anti-abortion group Priests For Life, urged mourners to keep striving for what the late Pope John Paul II called a "culture of life."

"God calls us to go forth from this place to work together, to preach, to proclaim and witness together so what happened in this tragic case will never happen again," Pavone said to a raucous round of applause.
A table beside the altar held a photo of Schiavo taken in the 1980s before she suffered brain damage, one of the pictures widely shown in the last days of the protracted right-to-die case. A photo and gold bust of the pope also were on the table.

Schiavo's parents had opposed her cremation and hoped to bury her in their adopted state of Florida. But her husband, Michael Schiavo, ordered her cremation and said her ashes would be buried in his family's plot in Pennsylvania, the state where Terri Schiavo grew up and where the couple met.

Michael Schiavo has not said when his memorial service will be held, but he is under a court order to notify the parents of his plans. His attorney, George Felos, did not return a call Tuesday seeking comment.

The service was called a celebration of the 41-year-old Schiavo's life, but much of it focused on her death at the end of the long court battle between her parents and her husband, reports Byrd.

Court-appointed doctors said she was in a persistent vegetative state, and Michael Schiavo said his wife would not want to be kept alive artificially. Her parents doubted she had such end-of-life wishes and disputed she was in a persistent vegetative state.

The dramatic case reached all the way to Congress, the U.S. Supreme Court, the Vatican and White House in recent weeks as the Schindlers tried to block the court order that allowed Michael Schiavo to remove the feeding tube.

"The Florida legislature has not heard the last from us, nor has the halls of Congress," O'Donnell told mourners.

Congress returned from a two-week Easter recess both emboldened and chagrined by its role in the Terri Schiavo case and the unexpected reaction from the public to it.

While a few lawmakers sought to punish the federal judges who rebuffed their hastily passed law aimed at getting Schiavo's feeding tube reinserted, most tried to put some distance between their action in March and what's on their plate this month.

"I think we ought to let the rhetoric cool off," Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said Tuesday.

Nonetheless, Congress returned this week bubbling with the emotional issues and public policy debates raised by Schiavo's plight. A Senate committee looking at whether the treatment of disabled people such as Schiavo should be better defined was warned by the father of a retarded Kansas man to tread carefully.

"Those debates frighten me, and they should alarm you, too," Rud Turnbull of Lawrence, Kan., the father of 37-year-old Jay Turnbull, said in remarks prepared for a Senate Health Committee hearing Wednesday. "The slippery slope is slick and awaits us all."

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, is writing legislation that would let federal courts review cases like Schiavo's — when there is no advance directive and there's a dispute over the person's wishes.

"Although Terri Schiavo very dramatically brought these issues to the attention of the nation, their importance did not fade or diminish with her loss," said Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., chairman of the committee holding Wednesday's hearing.

The bitter feud rippled to Capitol Hill last month. On March 20, lawmakers interrupted their Easter break to pass a bill directing federal courts to review whether her civil rights had been violated by the decision to remove her feeding tube.

Her death sparked intense rhetoric among lawmakers. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas suggested an impeachment case could be made against judges who rebuffed Congress' will.

"That to me should be of concern to Democrats and Republicans regardless of how you feel about the issue," said Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa.

However, other Republicans, chastened by polls showing that a large majority of Americans disapproved of Congress inserting itself into the Schiavo case, said both parties should back off from any efforts to take further action.

"I don't think there's a groundswell up here to take this issue and federalize it," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

Added Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore.: "I'm not for things that go after judges. They're an independent branch of government. We need to respect that."