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Hugh Finn's Struggle Is Finally Over
By Michael F. Flach
HERALD Staff Writer
MANASSAS — Hugh Finn’s struggle is finally over.
The 44-year-old former television newscaster died Oct. 9, eight days after a Virginia court ordered his feeding tube removed.
Just three days before Finn’s death, Virginia Delegate Bob Marshall described the highly publicized case as a "spiritual battle that captured the soul of the nation."
"I don’t know where it will end," said Marshall,
who joined the Finn family in the legal battle to save Hugh’s life. Finn
had been in a so-called "persistent vegetative state" since a 1995
automobile accident. He was moved to the Annaburg
Nursing Home in Manassas in 1996 to be closer to his parents, Joan and
Tom Finn, who are members of Our Lady of Angels Parish in Woodbridge.
Finn’s wife, Michele, successfully appealed through a Circuit Court judge to have her husband’s feeding and hydration tube removed on Oct. 1. A last-minute appeal by Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore to reverse the judge’s decision was denied by the Virginia State Supreme Court.
"I just don’t understand what Michele is doing," said her mother, Mary Margaret Keeley, who traveled from her home in Uniondale, Pa., to attend an Oct. 4 vigil outside the nursing home.
"I think that she has just become so devastated and just so confused and mixed up because of the terrible thing that happened," she said. "I don’t think that the judges have been able to hear Hugh Finn’s side of the story."
Marshall and fellow Virginia State Delegate
Richard Black spoke Oct. 6 to a group of Brent Society members and guests
at the Knights of Columbus Council Home in Annandale. Their
primary focus was the role of the Catholic
laity in the political arena, but the Finn case dominated the evening’s
discussion.
Both Black and Marshall compared the environment in American society today with the one that existed in 1930s Nazi Germany.
The Finn case "puts things in perspective," said Black. "There are some truly evil things taking place in this world."
Looking around at the moral state of society today, Marshall said, "America may have won the battles, but the Nazis won the war.
"You can no longer assume an individual’s moral compass," he said. "Starvation of an individual is now a debatable issue. We couldn’t even talk about it 30 years ago."
He said he has never seen anything as manipulative
in his life as what took place around Hugh Finn. The courts and doctors
now consider a patient "terminal" if he is in a persistent vegetative
state.
"Our job," he said, "is to not let them (doctors and lawyers) get away with euphemisms. You’ve got to deal in realities. We have to let the public see what is going on."
The Virginia delegate first got involved in the case in early August when he received a phone call from Finn’s sister-in-law, Elaine Glazier. After reviewing the case history and corresponding with Father Paul deLadurantaye, secretary for religious education in the Arlington Diocese, he decided to help Finn’s parents and other family members in their fight.
"If this starvation was going to take place, I didn’t want it to be in silence," Marshall said. "Evil loves the darkness."
Marshall said this is not the first time that such a case has taken place at the Annaburg Nursing Home. Four other episodes of patient starvation have been reported to him over the past several years.
Marshall, whose legislative district includes the nursing home, said the court refused to consider reports that Finn communicated with friends and family members with gestures, words, nods of the head and winks.
The fact that videotaping of Finn has not been allowed has kept the world in the dark concerning his ability to communicate, Marshall said.
Marshall appeared on "Good Morning America" on Oct. 5 and has been profiled in The Washington Post. He said the media have shown tremendous interest in the case because Finn was one of them.
"You can’t deny that Hugh Finn was a living, breathing human being," he said, referring to Finn’s career has a television journalist in Louisville.
Marshall said he has often asked himself, "Why is this case taking place here?"
"This is Virginia," he said. "This is where the original revolution began. Maybe it will start again here."
Black said there are two fundamental world views that run throughout the course of human history. One regards human beings as creatures "who survive at the pleasure of the state." The Catholic view regards human beings as children of God.
He said we are facing a downhill spiral that is consuming unborn children, the elderly, the infirmed and eventually those who disagree with the state.
"What do we do?" Black asked.
"There is a tendency to not participate, to be silent and passive," he said. "I invite you to search your souls and, in your own way, participate in this form of democracy."
He said we need to "raise up qualified candidates" to run for public office. "The time has come to take back our nation. I want to judge on morals. If we’re not a moral nation, then we have failed."
Copyright ©1998 Arlington Catholic Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.
This article was published in the Arlington
Catholic Herald Web Site,
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