The inspiring Steve Gleason used his voice to get important federal legislation passed for all with ALS

Like Steve Gleason, use your voice for change | Editorial

Posted Feb 9

Former Saints player Steve Gleason is on the sideline before an NFL football game against the Carolina Panthers in New Orleans Dec. 3, 2017. (Bill Feig/AP)

By The Times-Picayune Editorial Board

Former Saints star Steve Gleason lost his ability to speak two years after he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. But he had spent months recording nearly 5,000 sentences, and technology has given him a voice.
Gleason is able to pay the $14,000 for a speech-generating device, but many others are not. So, as he has so many times since his diagnosis in 2011, he fought for patients who don't have his resources.
Early Friday morning (Feb. 9) Congress approved the Steve Gleason Enduring Voices Act. It makes coverage by Medicare and Medicaid of speech-generating technology a permanent benefit.
This is a tremendous victory for Team Gleason and for people with ALS and similar diseases that rob people of the ability to communicate.
"When a person is diagnosed with ALS ... he is expected to fade away quietly and die. This is not okay. The average life expectancy is two to five years after diagnosis. Along with thousands of others, I am determined to not fade away quietly," Gleason said in a 2014 opinion column in The New York Times. "With a sense of purpose, the right support and the right technology, it is possible to live a meaningful life despite ALS."
His advocacy persuaded Congress in 2015 to temporarily order Medicare and Medicaid to pay for the technology. But the vote Friday removes the uncertainty and makes the coverage ongoing.

The dispute that led to a breakdown in Congress Thursday night over the budget put the Gleason act temporarily in peril. Gleason, using technology that allows him to type with his eyes, tweeted a plea Wednesday for compassion to overrule politics.
"Our issue is simple. People who lost the ability to physically communicate, need this legislation to protect access to technology that allows them to connect with the world around them," he said in a statement attached to the tweet. "This is not an entitlement bill, it is an empowerment bill, for people who want to be productive citizens," he said.
He also noted that the legislation passed unanimously in 2015, reflecting strong bipartisan support. In a tweet Friday, Gleason thanked Louisiana Republicans Sen. Bill Cassidy and House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and Democrat Cedric Richmond, among others, for their leadership.
Team Gleason has committed its own resources to patients in need, too. The foundation provided more than $1 million in 2016 in technology to give people with ALS the ability to communicate.
"Communication is one of the most powerful tools humans possess, and is often taken for granted," Gleason said in April 2015 when the act named for him originally passed the Senate. "However, when you lose the ability to move and speak, communication becomes not only empowering, but also life sustaining."

Gleason's approach to his disease is inspiring. He recognized that he could use his fame as a former Saints special teams ace to help other patients and advocate for policy changes. He expressed his inspiration in a speech at a fund-raiser for Son of a Saint in 2013, after he had lost his ability to speak. "Without tragedy, we cannot be heroes," he said. And "the greater the tragedy, the greater the opportunity."
His work is reminiscent of Superman star Christopher Reeve, who fought for increased research into reversing paralysis after his 1995 spinal cord injury. Reeve worked with Congress in 1999 to pass the Work Incentives Improvement Act, which allowed people with disabilities to return to work and still receive benefits.
He also directed a television movie in New Orleans the summer before he died in October 2004. Lara Grice, who played a teacher in the film, told The New York Times then that action on the set would stop when Reeve was giving direction through his audio hookup from a production booth.
"People would stay still and listen and pay attention to what he was saying, even if it didn't pertain to them," she said. "They held their work so he was able to finish his sentences."

That is the power of words, for all of us, not just a director or an NFL star. Steve Gleason has ensured that thousands of people whose bodies are working against them will still have a voice. He even brought Congress together, at least for a moment. And he has shown how we can all use our voices to bring about change.

At National Prayer Breakfast, Rep. Steve Scalise speaks of God and the miracles resulting from his shooting

I am providing the full link here so you can have a chance to view many of the videos in this one story.  The introduction of Scalise by his friend, Democratic Representative Cedric Richmond is worth the view as is the keynote address of Scalise.

There is a transcript to follow the address of Rep. Scalise.

One thing his testimony drives home, God answers prayers and our prayers for one another are important.

Please view this link and the associated videos:


http://www.nola.com/religion/index.ssf/2018/02/prayer_breakfast_steve_scalise.html#incart_river_index

Our Catholic newspaper has this nice story on the miracle of Representative Steve Scalise

Latest News Peter Finney Jr. Columns 

October 3, 2017October 4, 2017

The power of prayer

Posted By: Jonelle Foltz Archbishop Rummel High School, House Majority Whip, House of Representatives, Jennifer Scalise, power of prayer, prayer, St. Catherine of Siena, Steve Scalise, Tommy Cvitanovich

By Peter Finney Jr.
From the packed upper gallery of the House of Representatives on Sept. 28, Jennifer Scalise, New Orleans restaurateur Tommy Cvitanovich and a small cohort of unpretentious life-savers watched a miracle unfold below them.
News travels fast in Washington, D.C., but no more than a handful of people on the House floor knew until House Majority Leader Paul Ryan slammed his gavel and the doors opened to the chamber floor that Steve Scalise, the Louisiana Republican from Metairie who serves as the House Majority Whip, was reporting for duty once again, 3 1/2 months after he was nearly killed in June by a rifle shot while practicing for a Congressional charity baseball game.
“This was right at the top of the cool factor,” said Cvitanovich, whose family runs Drago’s Seafood Restaurant in Metairie. “Paul Ryan steps up and starts banging the gavel. Everyone starts looking around, and they’re like, ‘What’s going on here?’ He asked everybody to take their seats, and then he banged the gavel real hard. I mean, you could hear a pin drop.”
Then the doors opened, and Scalise, smiling broadly, walked in, carefully coordinating the movement of his two crutches, as the entire House erupted.
As Scalise slowly walked up several rows to his seat, Ryan banged the speaker’s gavel again and said: “The gentleman is recognized for as much time as he may have!
Scalise addressed his colleagues for only 13 minutes, but he had plenty to say.
“You have no idea how great this feels to be back here at work in the people’s house,” he said, adding that his brush with death and relearning how to walk had been “pretty challenging times for me and my family,” eased by the outpouring of “love, warmth and prayer” from friends and total strangers.
“And it starts with God,” Scalise said. “When I was laying out on that ball field, the first thing I did, once I was down and I couldn’t move anymore, is I just started to pray. I will tell you it gave me an unbelievable sense of calm knowing that at that point, it was in God’s hands. But I prayed for very specific things, and I will tell you, pretty much every one of those prayers was answered, and they were some pretty challenging prayers I was putting in God’s hands. He really did deliver for me and my family.
“The power of prayer is something you just cannot underestimate, so I am definitely an example that miracles really do happen.”
Scalise, a 1983 graduate of Archbishop Rummel High School and a parishioner of St. Catherine of Siena Parish in Metairie, said he probably never would have made it to the hospital had it not been for several small miracles.
Because he was a Republican leader in the House, he was assigned a security detail from the U.S. Capitol Police. Officers Crystal Griner and David Bailey were able to return fire and killed the would-be assassin before he could inflict further harm.
“When I was laying there not long after the first couple of shots were fired, I could hear a different caliber weapon, and that told me that they had immediately engaged the shooter,” Scalise said.
After the shooter was killed, Ohio Republican Congressman Brad Wenstrup, a former Army Ranger and physician, rushed over to Scalise and applied a tourniquet that helped stop some of the blood flow.
Scalise looked to the gallery and thanked Dr. Jack Sava and Dr. Rob Golden for their life-giving care.
Cvitanovich, a 1977 Rummel graduate and a good friend of Scalise, prayed for weeks with the Congressman’s family and organized daily overnight shipments of comfort food to Scalise via FedEx from a brigade of New Orleans-area chefs. Cvitanovich wore a pair of Rummel High School cuff   links to the speech.
“We’ve been doing food for the last six weeks,” Cvitanovich said. “About half the time it was my food. The other half of the time it was from a wide array of restaurants – I’ve sent Rocky and Carlo’s. When the Saints played the Vikings on Monday Night Football, I sent him nachos from the Superdome. One weekend when his kids were there, I sent Lucky Dogs with the Lucky Dog hats.
“We sent Galatoire’s, Emeril’s, Brennan’s, Arnaud’s, Zea’s ribs, P.J.’s (coffee), even restaurants in Lafayette and Baton Rouge. You name it, we sent it up to him. Everybody, everybody, including employees at restaurants, when they knew what we were doing, was 100 percent in. Nobody rolled their eyes.”
Cvitanovich said a meaningful gesture came from Louisiana Democratic Congressman Cedric Richmond, who often disagrees politically with Scalise, moving over to the Republican side of the House to sit right behind Scalise as he addressed his colleagues.
“You talk about the power of unity,” Cvitanovich said. “That was strong. That’s why the applause was so massive. The attack on Steve was an attack on the American people, and this is the house of the people. When you realize this was an attack on the American people, it does change you.”
Cvitanovich says he hopes a blessing from this tragedy will be better cooperation among polarized political parties.
“We need to express our differences, but then we need to get together and break bread, no two ways about it,” Cvitanovich said. “That’s what everybody in that room got from him. It was, ‘Hey guys, I got shot, but this was an attack on the American people. This was an attack on our institutions.’ They’re going to walk out there being Republicans and Democrats,  but they got that message. We can’t viciously attack each other. You can be different and stand your ground, but treat everybody as humans and treat everybody with respect. I just hope this horrible tragedy does turn the needle a little bit in the other direction.”
Peter Finney Jr. can be reached at pfinney@clarionherald.org

Rep. Steve Scalise gets many prayers from his home parish in the Archdiocese of New Orleans

More than 150 people attended a prayer service at St. Catherine of Siena Church in Metairie tonight to pray for the recovery of House Majority Whip Steve Scalis...e, R-La., and other victims of a shooting in Alexandria, Virginia, this morning.

Scalise, his wife Jennifer and their two children are members of St. Catherine of Siena Parish. The Congressman from the 1st District of Louisiana was gunned down by a lone gunman while practicing with other Republican Congressmen and staff members for a charity baseball game.
Scalise was listed in critical condition after sustaining a bullet to the hip that also caused serious internal bleeding. Doctors said he would require additional surgeries.
Father Ronald Calkins, pastor of St. Catherine of Siena, said the prayer service was for the shooting victims and also for those who mourn for them.
"We come here to pray to God, who is always with us and always supporting us and always helping us," Father Calkins said. "We pray especially for those who were injured. Of course, we also come just to support each other.
"Even if all we did was to come into this church and there was no prayer service, and all we did was spend time in prayer quietly, we're together, supporting each other. That's very important. We also need to recommit ourselves to being people of peace, people of justice. Violence is never really the answer. Our Lord Jesus was a person of peace, a person of non-violence, so we are his followers, his disciples. We call ourselves Christians because we follow Jesus Christ."
Maria Naccari, who taught Scalise's daughter Madison in pre-kindergarten at St. Catherine of Siena School, said she has always been impressed by the Scalise family's down-to-earth attitude. When Scalise would show up with his security detail to pick up his children from school in the afternoon, she said, he never pulled rank or asked to come to the front of the line.
"They wait in line – there is no cut in line," Naccari said. "They wait like everyone else, and he follows all the rules. It's adorable. I think that's what makes him so likable to everybody. They're just regular people with a different job."
"Sweet, sweet family – Mom and Dad totally involved with walking them to class. They are just normal, everyday parents. Unless you knew who he was, you would not know who he was, if that makes sense."
Madison is entering fifth grade, and Harrison Scalise, their son, just made his First Communion and is going into third grade.
"I was very, very upset, just because he's a genuine person," Naccari said. "He's a real person. You don't think of him as a politician, but as a real dad. You think of him as an involved, regular St. Catherine person. And you think of his wife in the same way. There's no fluff about him. He's a real dad, a common person, really a Daddy."

Prayers for our Louisiana Congressman

Representative Steve Scalise from Metairie, our Congressman and House Majority Whip, a husband, father and devout Catholic, shot in Virginia practicing baseball.

Shot in the hip, the expectation is this is not life threatening but more details to follow.

Others shot too including policemen guarding the Congressman.

No politics; just pray.  At any level, this is horrible.

A New Orleans area Baptist Pastor shares a balanced approach to immigration, implores help from Representative Scalise

Praying Rep. Steve Scalise will lead on immigration: David Crosby

In this Sept. 6, 2012, photo, cotton farmer Teofilo Flores drives his truck along the U.S.-Mexico border fence that passes through his property in Brownsville, Texas. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

 

By Contributing Op-Ed columnist The Times-Picayune
on July 04, 2014 

 

U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise has vaulted into a formal leadership role within the House of Representatives just as we hear that the House will not be moving immigration reform forward this year.
That would be a major disappointment. Like many other Christians across the nation, I am praying that Rep. Scalise and his colleagues will yet help our country find long-term solutions on this vexing issue. I am disappointed that our elected officials are unwilling to deal with this issue so vital to the welfare of all who live within our borders.
I was personally delighted to see Rep. Scalise elected to serve as House Majority Whip. He has represented his Louisiana district with distinction, including leading on key issues of concern to Christians such as protecting life in the womb and defending religious liberty.
Immigration is actually a very common theme in the Bible. In fact, Jesus' famous instruction to "love your neighbor" is a quote from the Old Testament teaching on caring for foreigners as if they were native-born.
God repeatedly commands the Israelites to love and welcome the immigrants who come into their land, remembering their own history as foreigners in the land of Egypt. God makes clear his concern for those who are vulnerable, repeatedly mentioning the immigrant alongside the fatherless and the widow as groups in need of special protections.
At First Baptist New Orleans, we've tried to put these biblical teachings into practice in a variety of ways. As we've reached out to the many immigrants in New Orleans, this issue has become very personal for our congregation.
Immigration is no longer about statistics. It is about faces and names of individuals we have come to know, many of whom participate in our ministries. I cannot watch a brother or sister suffer without speaking up.
I have seen the wounded -- broken ribs, gunshots, and stab wounds -- whose stories illustrate the need for reforms to our immigration laws. Undocumented immigrants, often victims of assault and other crimes, are afraid to access medical care or to report crimes to the police. Their desperate need and terrible isolation speaks to the suffering endured by millions who live in the shadows of our society.
The longer our dysfunctional laws go unaddressed, the greater the suffering. I urge Rep. Scalise to lead the House of Representatives in acting on immigration this summer.
Do not construe this as a call for amnesty. While individual Christians are called to forgive, the government has been instituted by God to maintain order, and it has a responsibility to respect the rule of law. Amnesty -- forgiving and forgetting the violation of law -- is not a good option.
The reality, though, is that our immigration laws have been disrespected and only selectively enforced for decades: The current situation is a de facto amnesty. Still, almost no one in Washington, D.C., advocates deporting all of the approximately 11 million people present unlawfully in the United States. That would cost hundreds of billions of dollars and necessarily divide families that include both U.S. citizens and undocumented immigrants in the same family.
Because mass deportation and amnesty are both non-solutions, the only reasonable response to those present in our country unlawfully is to impose an alternate penalty. I've joined other evangelical leaders in calling for an earned legalization process that would require immigrants here illegally to come forward, pay a fine for having violated the law and then undergo a criminal background check.
Those who have committed serious crimes would be deported, but the majority of undocumented immigrants, who have been otherwise law-abiding, could earn the chance to stay lawfully in the country if they could meet a stringent set of requirements. Combined with improvements to border security and a more market-sensitive visa system, these reforms actually would restore the rule of law.
Polls find that the vast majority of Americans, including most evangelical Christians, support these sorts of reforms. We are tired of waiting. As politicians bicker, people here in Louisiana suffer.
My fervent prayer is that as Rep. Scalise assumes his new position of leadership, he will use his influence to genuinely lead on this urgent topic.
Rev. David Crosby is the senior pastor of First Baptist Church of New Orleans.

Our local U.S. Rep. praises the Bishops; compare and contrast Scalise remarks to those of Nancy Pelosi at end of article

Rep. Steve Scalise praises Catholic bishops for fight against contraceptive mandate

Published: Sunday, February 19, 2012, 9:00 PM

By Times-Picayune Staff The Times-Picayune

As the House prepared to take a week-long recess late last week, it was apparent the flap over President Barack Obama's compromise plan to require health insurance firms to provide free access to contraceptives isn't going away. There was a tumultuous hearing by a House committee, in which a Roman Catholic bishop, Orthodox rabbi and Lutheran and Baptist clergy said the president's plan, though an improvement over his original proposal, doesn't give religious employers a "conscience" clause freeing them from providing coverage for birth control devices they object to on religious grounds.

View full sizeDavid Grunfeld, The Times-Picayune archiveRep. Steve Scalise was photographed in Madisonville in October.

 

Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, who is leading an effort for congressional intervention, praised the Catholic bishops for leading a fight against the administration rule. "I want to applaud the Catholic bishops who have been so vocal in helping bring this issue to light, for standing up and saying, 'This is something that we will not comply with because it violates our own religious beliefs.'"
Some House Democrats complained that the GOP-scheduled hearing on the issue excluded some women who believe that birth control services should be a mandated part of health insurance. "What is it that men don't understand about women's health," House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said. "And how central the issue of family planning is to that."