Dale & Shannon Hickman, Faith Healing Nutjobs, Allowed Child to Die at Birth Without Medical Attention

• Mark, you know not of what you speak concerning God, and if you still feel that way when your time comes to face Him, then I will feel very sorry for you. These people do not represent Christians, of which I am one. I would never deprive my child of medical care based on my religious beliefs. It's deplorible and they are where they belong, in jail!

• These people do not represent Christianity in any way, shape or form. They just "claim the name".

• it's folks like this, WBC, and ALL the truly bad clergy that is giving Christianity a bad name. I got the feeling that if Christ was to show up. that he would cast the entire lot into the Christian version of Hades.

• I completely support religious freedom. If these nutjobs don't want treatment or medication, fine. But when they get kids involved, I get annoyed. (Even if the kid says he doesn't want medication, you have to assume that he is either brainwashed by his family or saying that so his family won't disown him.) Stories like this disgust me. I definitely agree with a charge of murder.

• Not all doctors and medicine are good and right either, but I agree april religions like these suck.

• wtf what the hell!!! this is why i hate religion and dont believe in

• *smh* *drag* *swiggggg* *smhsm* I have no problems with God, it's his Fan Club I can't Tolerate..

• If the church is telling these people not to take their children to the hospital because faith heals all wounds, can they be held accountable for the deaths as well?

• The really interesting thing is that no matter how many times this happens to members of this church--no matter how many of their kids die, they immediately go back to the church as if nothing happened. This is an excellent example of how unquestioning religious fanaticism can warp your mind and make you abandon all common sense. Dont fall into the trap!

• Thank God they're going to jail.

• I hope they don't use their religion to get off on this shit. You know, the whole 'God is the only healer, he made me do it' kind of crap. This story saddens me.

• They just prayed to the wrong God...maybe next time

• knees

• I bet they did not pray hard enough.

• I do not think organized religion is good for the world. It is a bone of contention and causes too much bloodshed. Although I think Jesus was a marvelous human being, I also think if he were around today, he would want NOTHING to do with the so-called "Christians" of the world today. Everything he stood for a preached has been trashed and turned into a money pit.

• @Dylan, Amen brother! Testify! Methinks we need to change that proverb "Physician, heal thyself!" in Luke to "Religious nutjobs, get a clue!".

• To the best of my knowledge nowhere in the bible does it say: "And thou shalt not go and seek healing from laymen and healers" Religious nutjobs, HEALERS are DOCTORS. K?

• I can't fathom deciding to rely on prayer to save your own child. If you want to pray that the doctor can cure them, great. Medical advances could very easily be "G-d's work" if that makes it easier to understand. These people shouldn't be allowed to have children. It is wrong to put a child in danger by allowing them to stay with a family that will not get them medical attention if they become hurt or dangerously ill. It is one thing to choose for yourself not to go to a doctor. A child has no choice in the matter.

• So I assume they won't be needing a lawyer in court? They can just pray, right?

• What these people did is unbelievable, and they clearly are a disgusting couple…match made in hell. The fact that people are chalking this up to religion is also pretty unbelievable. Religion does not breed despicable losers like these. Religion gives people tools to interpret and examine life and their place within it. Key word is interpret...if it happens to be that at the pondering end is an ass, what kind of interpretations do you think they will make? No matter what the religion, there are disgusting people everywhere...hey maybe even some in your family! Also a side note- antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections, only.

• You know, I don't believe in Medication or in Pills in general but jesus what in the name of your God would NOT make you seek medical attention when your CHILD obviously needed it? If the only way to help a dying child is a damn shot and a little bit of aspiring then get the hell over yourself. *shakes head* This is why I hate Religion. Not the Religious or Faith but Religion.

• I understand now Mark your talking about cruel in the method that the system is cruel to people based on the way they pay or can't pay. I thought you meant cruel as in the method by which it is used on it's patients or the way we gather information to make it better. The system your describing makes it sound like medicine is used to kill people who can't afford treatment. You are right about how it's just used too much. The problem with using too much antibiotics is that bacteria evolve very fast, and what might have killed them in the past won't stop them again. The overuse of antibiotics has caused things like the deadly form of the AIDS virus and MRSA. So it is possible for medicine to be used too much. Just be careful just cause we don't have a cure for it doesn't mean we're not working on one. This kind of research has lead to many vaccines that keep us from getting sick in the first place. A vaccine may not be a cure but it will prevent us from getting it and maybe dying later.

• I just cut out the middleman and became an Atheist, cause I think every religion on the planet is so full of themselves that they forgot the whole reason religion was invented in the first place, to make people feel better about the life they lead and giving reassurance that when they die there's something better waiting for them on the other side. As long as most religions continue to try and control aspects of everyone's lives regardless of what those other people feel, I will continue to doubt their philosophies. I won't stop you from having your faith, but as soon as your faith is forced into my life, we have a problem.

• Angry Grandma - What is "fake" blood? Just curious. Thanks.

• @Rando, it may sound confusing if you don't work in the Health Care industry, but ask any R.N. and they'll agree that Modern Medicine is barbarous and woefully broken. That isn't to say that leeches and prayer are any better. That's a step in entirely the wrong direction. However Western Medicine treats symptoms rather than cure causes because not only is it quicker and easier to treat, but quicker, easier and CHEAPER to develop treatments than to develop cures. Besides, a cure only has to be applied once, whereas a treatment could take a lifetime. Wherefore then is the profit in curing the sick? Modern Medicine recklessly over-medicates it's patients with risky (oftentimes untested) pharmaceuticals with serious side-effects at the behest of the Pharmaceutical companies that dictate Federal Policy. While Insurance Companies dictate what is and isn't acceptable Medical Procedures based entirely upon the bottom-line profit-margin of a Financial Sheet. Two words that should have never been mixed from the very beginning are "Capitalism" and "Health Care". The result of mixing those two systems has not only stagnated Modern Medicine, but created a self-perpetuating Medical Industrial Complex that no longer serves in the interests of the Hippocratic Oath but serves the interests of itself and the All-Mighty Dollar instead. There are far better ways to heal the sick than to prescribe pills. Rather than try to prevent Alzheimer's (an entirely Western condition) which can easily be done, we opt for prescribing complex cocktails of pharmaceuticals to treat Alzheimer's with little or no success but at a great financial benefit to the Medical Industrial Complex. Rather than try to help the clinically Depressed accept their condition and adapt to have functional and full lives, psychologists prescribe complex cocktails of very dangerous and unpredictable pharmaceuticals as if they were candy that ultimately makes their patients dependent upon them as if they were addicts. Western Medicine is beginning to figure out how barbarous it still is. When we realize that we've just ascended to a level of Medicine that is barely equivalent of the Ancient Chinese and Ancient Egyptians (the latter of which routinely performed surgery, including brain surgery, and had diagnosed and CURED cancer), we realize that we still have a long ways to go. The discovery of Prions was the wake-up call for researchers in Western Medicine, helping us realize that the entire way we approach healing the sick is backwards (and upside down). STILL, even though Modern Medicine may be just barely beyond leeches, it is still preferable to the primitive Western Medicine of yesteryear, be it leeches, prayer, and folk-medicine. I might decline a senseless and potentially dangerous Vaccination like Varicella, but I'd rather have at least a Mid-wife, if not an entire Neo-Natal E.R. Crash Cart Team, at my child's birth than rely entirely upon a hope and a prayer.

• Rando, I actually agree with your statement. Which is pretty sad. Not that i agree. But that i agree that the rules of other's faith are confusing and mind boggling to outsiders. And believe me. I was there at a point in my young life. Thought something important was missing in my life. Thought maybe church was the answer. So back to church i go. Catholic wasn't for me. I tried Southern Baptist, pentacostal,jehova's witness, protestant, regular baptist ect. Only ones i haven't tried: Jewish and Islam. But after all these years, i have finally decided that i don't need a middle man to speak to the Lord for me. so i know keep my only council. and sorry, life is always drama and experiences. Granted i have had more then my fair share. and i don't think it would make any kind of a movie. Coming from a large family (i'm youngest) of 6, with 32 grandchildren and 39 greatgrandchildren makes for a bunch of drama. and that's just my immediate family! My dad was oldest of 12 and my mom oldest of 9! Enuff said.

• No, cause most midwives have some form of medical or nurse's training, some people are lenient when it comes to the rules they will follow and others think every aspect of their faith must be followed, even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff. There's just no wiggle room when it comes to a literal interpretation of someone's faith, they will follow it even if it seems insane to outsiders. If you do get lucky and nail her bending one of her faiths rules you can usually get them to loosen up, but the die-hard followers usually have an excuse to get out of it, so keep asking her hypotheticals until you catch her...have fun.

• @ Angry Grandma - I think you should have your life story made into a movie. You have more drama/incidents than anyone I've ever heard of. Frankly, it makes my day more interesting to hear your stories. We all know you can't spell and that your grammar's not the best (lol), but you have a good heart and that counts. I'm out. I've got to go get ready for my fantasy football draft. You guys carry on.

• Oh this just came to me... If this church preachs faith healing, and they allow home births, why wouldn't they have at least one midwife in the church? Wouldn't that make sense? Then no child will die.

• Welcome to organized religion. As a lapse catholic, i see a lot of stuff i didn't when i was a active catholic. And for a religion to allow this kind of thinking is out there. Even 'bible thumpers', 'snake handlers', 'holy rollers' ect know when a hospital/doctor is needed and that faith alone isn't going to help. Again, organized religion. a lot of younger people are searching for a cause right now. and as they may think this 'church' is the one for them, i don't believe that this couple was as stupid and cow herded as they are making out to be. A huge example: my ex sister in law is a Jehova's witness. Has been for over 30 yrs. They don't believe in smoking, unmarried relations, blood transfusions, drugs and alchol. But my lovely brother was a low life pot dealer back in the day. she didn't complain whenever he handed her money all the time. she didn't complain when he had affairs. or his smoking or his drug and alchol use. But when her 5 yr old child fell and rammed her front teeth into the gums and out the top lip, she wouldn't take her to the hospital. my brother and i did. Same thing when son broke arm in 3 places, wouldn't take him to hospital. My brother did. And when my niece had a baby 6 weeks early and he weighted 1 1/2 pounds, she at first told my niece that it was Jehova's way if Ivan didn't make it. But when my niece demanded that they try all they could to save him. She slowly came around. But she still refuses hospitals and our local hospitals have the 'fake' blood here. We have a lot of Jahova Witnesses here. "shakes head"

• Modern medicine seems barbarous to you Mark, well what is the superior alternative you claim to know of, cause I'm confused. The only way to treat a cut is to sew it back together, treat disease we use antibiotics that get injected into the skin, and broken bones get set in place with screws or put into a cast. Is this the stuff you are talking about being "barbarous"? I don't mean to insult you it just sounds confusing, can I get some clarification.

• cw, agreed. These blind follower types are exactly who get themselves into completely avoidable trouble by refusing to take personal responsibility for themselves. I'm always baffled by true believers of whatever religion who always go too far. The old adage "moderation in all things" is especially true for whole life systems. This where picking and choosing from a variety of sources is so very important. It's like overbreeding a dog breed to make it's bloodline super pure, and end up with a deformed mutant. These two should be made examples. Throw them in jail, make them break rocks every day, for the rest of their lives. Sadly, parents are too often allowed to kill their children and essentially get away with it.

• I can't stand Bible Thumpers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They are the biggest hippocrits I have ever seen and often at times the most perverted!!!!!

• I am disgusted by this-ignorance on a grand scale that caused the death of a child

• Hmm, is Faith Healing an unconscious attempt to bring back Darwinism? Seems to me that is precisely what this misguided belief is doing. But I thought Christian fanatics didn't believe in Darwinism? Perhaps that is why they protest so loudly about Darwinism? Just something to ponder there. @Rando, I always personally thought Modern Medicine was still barbarous and primitive, using scalpels and treating symptoms rather than addressing the cause. However, it certainly isn't the Dark Ages anymore, and although we often hear goofballs with myopic vision talking about how things were better in the "Good Old Days" I never thought anyone would idealize the Dark Ages of superstition. Back then even the most basic Medicine of Paracelsus and Albertus Magnus was a burning offense of heresy, yet superstitious prayers and folk-magic was somehow acceptable. In an age where Universal Health Care is the topic du jour that is on everyone's minds, you'd think that there would no longer be people like this that would deny Health Care to their own children. To debate on whether to allow or deny Universal Health Care to illegal immigrants is one thing, but to debate on whether to allow or deny Universal Health Care to your own child seems outrageously anachronistic. I suppose this is what happens when you don't teach people how to read (or only let them read one and only one book). I wonder if their God will answer their prayers from prison? (Although if they are like anyone else in prison they'll probably end up converting to Islam, which comparatively would probably be an improvement!) ;)

• I just don't understand this type of thinking at all.

• Shame shame shame! I'm with you Pete God gave man the power to use his brain to come up with all these wonderful modern medicines and technology that keeps us together. Using God and faith as an excuse to forgo common sense is just absolutely retarded! There is no excuse for stupidity people none! Not even religion!

• Yeah, you'd think with all the advances we made in medicine that people would have stopped using leeches and prayer to make things all right, well apparently we're wrong. These kids deaths are proof of it.

• This saddens me. I understand having faith in God and that's great. However, this isn't the first story (and I'm sure it won't be the last) like this. How about having a little faith in doctors. A little common sense goes a long way.

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