8mm
Posted on 11/23/2007 9:55:56 AM PST by wagglebee
VATICAN, November 21, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI has again come out with strong statements condemning the culture of death and encouraging scientists, researchers, medical personnel and pastoral workers to respect the value of life in the face of growing demands to euthanize the elderly sick.
The Pope expressed his concern to participants of the 22nd international conference promoted by the Pontifical Council for Health Care, held last week, which focused on the pastoral care of elderly sick people.
In his address he described "today's mentality of efficiency" which views the elderly infirm as a burden and problem for society, and added that euthanasia "appears as one of the more alarming symptoms of the culture of death that is advancing above all in prosperous societies."
Pope Benedict has repeatedly encouraged world leaders to promote respect for life from its natural beginning as a gift from God, to its natural end, and to resist "the temptation to have recourse to the practices of shortening the life of the elderly or the sick, practices that would in fact result in forms of euthanasia."
He emphasized that "Man's life is a gift of God, which all of us are always called to protect. This must also involve health workers, whose specific mission is to be 'servants of life' in all its phases, especially in that phase marked by the fragility connected with infirmity."
He also spoke of the role of families to care for their elderly at home, with the support and encouragement of medical professionals and pastoral workers. "In general it is opportune to do what is possible for the families themselves to welcome and with grateful affection take care of them so that the elderly who are sick can pass the last period of their life at home and prepare themselves for death in a climate of family warmth."
In a recent address to Austrian political leaders, the Pope spoke of his determination to continue to appeal to European government authorities to defend the fundamental human right, the right to life, and to promote healthcare systems that provide proper care for the gravely ill and dying. (See LifeSiteNews.com coverage: Pope: "The fundamental human right, the presupposition of every other right, is the right to life itself" (http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/sep/ 07090702.html)
Well said.
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Thank you
The Nazis were very efficient.
Being a Catholic, the only thing I would disagree with the Pope on this is if a person is in such pain that they just can’t handle it any longer. Doctor’s can only do so much and it doesn’t do any good to put someone in a coma to stop the pain. Unless we have been in such pain, we can’t begin to realize how your mind will look at this subject.
I had a Polish helper with my aunt. When I had them put a feeding tube into her stomach, she just shook her head and said, "Poland, no". She was a devout catholic, and we could not communicate very well, but I got the distinct feeling that my efforts toward the end on behalf of my aunt were stupid. My aunt would have died more quickly if we had just let her starve to death - which is natural for the end stages of life for many who just stop eating.
I have trouble with prolonging life by artificial means, including feeding tubes, especially if it means more and longer suffering, and there seems to be a trend here in the US, that when patients enter the terminal stages of their dying process, they are deliberately given overdoses of something so they won't have to suffer the final death agony so much. Morally, I am against it on principle, but who wants to hear days of screaming and moaning, and how must the patient feel? I have to at least think about it and consider maybe it is more merciful, but I would not like that decision on my conscience. Still, after watching prolonged suffering, that would be on my conscience, too.
As to caring for elderly in their homes, some of them don't care when they get too far gone. If the family has the means to do it, it is probably the most normal way, but with both husband, wife, and most family working, few have the means to care for elderly at home to the very end without hiring a helper or having good professional in-home help, not just checking in to see how the patient is doing. It is a terrible burden for one person to have to carry alone, care of a dying patient, lifting, turning, bathing, trying to get food down them, medicating, keeping the laundry done (more of that), keeping the home clean, all of it, especially if prolonged, is very hard on a single caregiver. Some are so devoted, it doesn't seem like such a burden.
I have seen people neglect their own health and get so burned out from trying to care for an elderly parent at home by themselves that they end up needing a LOT of care themselves, blood pressure soars, teeth go, can't tend to teeth if no money and until the blood pressure is under control, mental and/or physical breakdown from it. I have seen it. Is that a good thing just to keep them at home? I would not want to put my family through that after dealing with it myself, am not looking forward to it because I have seen what happens in nursing homes even if you aren't euthanized. Your stuff is stolen right and left, even in good cathoic ones, and patients are neglected. I have heard patients calling and calling for help, stuck in a chair, helpless, and no one comes. I go in their room and try to comfort them myself, what can I do? It's pathetic.
Modern-day children, some are too selfish to make the sacrifice, and then we get to the subject of outright abuse and exploitation of finances of elderly by their own children or relatives.
Sometimes, as bad as it was, I think it was better when we didn't have so many choices. That was life, and you dealt with it the best you could and didn't end up feeling guilty from having made the wrong choice. Nobody would have dreamed of euthanizing anybody. It was a given and part of your cross in life if the responsibility fell on you, you just dealt with it, and it was very hard for many families I am sure, especially poorer ones, and I am not talking dirt poor either. It costs a lot to die and be buried.
The pope can lecture and write about it, but popes get the best of what is available in the way of care, certainly not the norm. It is a whole different world for them, and they are used to being taken care of anyway. We have a bishop in our diocese which has fallen on hard times who actually does his own housecleaning and loves to garden. Kudos to him. Of course, a point is reached where no one is able to do that for themselves unless they have a sudden death.
Along with increased Socialism, the death cult rises - abortion, euthanasia; further divide and conquer tactics in general; lies by either commission or omission by the MSM; anti-family values insidiously, or even overtly, aimed at our children in “education”, nay, indoctrination centers, all issued in concert while Brittany takes the headlines, and the sheeple escape into garbage TV.
For me, there is a difference between “living” and “living life.”
The night before Thanksgiving a good family friend was hit by a car and suffered two fractured legs, a broken back and a fractured skull. He had just 10% brain function 48 hours after the accident with no chance of regaining any. Did his immediate family decide to keep him alive with machines? No. Did they follow his wishes? Yes. God took him peacefully today. For a man with such potential yet so much trouble, I hope he finally rests in peace.
I believe it is up to the victim to decide whether or not they want to die peacefully and end their suffering.
I don’t think it’s about efficiency, I think it’s about realizing there’s more to life than a pulse. I did volunteer work in an old folks home as a teen and I wouldn’t want to spend any time, or see my loved ones spend any time, in the same shape as the ward 3 people. Ward 3 is where they kept the ones that were basically dead but their autonomic systems hadn’t figured it out yet, people curled into fetal positions on their beds 24/7, people who couldn’t feed themselves, people who couldn’t communicate in anyway, people that you hope were no longer aware of their surroundings. Then of course there’s the ward 4 people with dementia, I’d rather avoid that too. While I can agree that some elements of the euthanasia movement take things too far and seem downright eager to kill people I can’t write off the whole movement. Modern medicine has gotten over addicted to keeping the heart beating and ignoring everything else.
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I just wish our American bishops would be. They got to put their feet down and stand by the Faith, not this wishy washy nonsense of letting politicians who claim to be Catholic to skate. They are the ones making the policies for the culture of death.
It's too easy to make a mistake if someone is branded terminal but they're not. It's like sending someone to death row who is innocent. DNA evidence can sort those folks out but what about the person who's been diagnosed as terminal but they're not? They are subject to being killed for exploitation such as life insurance policies and financial gain.
People who are not terminal are being thrown into the mix. The Pope says from conception to natural death. I'm not a Catholic but Thou Shalt Not Kill means just that.
The culture of death would like to be able to put down the elderly and disabled the way we put pets down.
When we put people and animals on the same level, it doesn't serve mankind. It serves the culture of death and they not only worship it but they profit from it.
I often wonder how many people out there have stood on the brink of suicide and decided against it at the last second. I would bet it's not an inconsequential number, but of course, I doubt that it would be possible to gather any valic statistics on the matter. Nevertheless, I think it's significant that people who have been in such despair and despondency or perhaps even physical pain, have decided at the last second that in spite of their troubles, life was better than the alternative.
Having said that, people commiting a "physician assisted" suicide would not have any recourse at the last second, and with that fleeting change of the person's will, the physician becomes a murderer commiting a societally sanctioned murder.
I don't think that's where we want to go as a society.
http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/811744874.html
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