Posted on 01/17/2009 12:29:45 PM PST by wagglebee
Those who have embraced the culture of death had much to celebrate during 2008. By “culture of death,” I’m referring to those movements which would advance euthanasia, assisted suicide, abortion, fetal experimentation, and even population control.
Let’s take a quick look at the year gone by. I think you’ll see what I mean.
In the U.S., voters in Washington state approved the grotesquely named “Death with Dignity Act,” which will allow physicians to prescribe lethal doses of drugs to their terminally ill patients. Washington joins Oregon as the only states (for now) that have legalized assisted suicide. Two down, 48 to go.
Of course there was other significant news in the other Washington, Washington, DC, where the new administration began to set up shop in the White House—an administration that promised during the campaign to enact the “Freedom of Choice Act,” or FOCA.
FOCA will, in essence, eliminate most restrictions on abortion. Parental notification, informed consent, conscientious objection on behalf of healthcare providers, restrictions on late-term abortions, could well be things of the past. Not for nothing did the Catholic Bishops describe FOCA as “the most radical and extreme abortion legislation ever considered in the United States.”
And, of course, the new administration will do all that it can to promote the use of human embryos for stem cell research.
On the other side of the pond, legislators in the small nation of Luxembourg decided that the “right to death” was so important, that they stripped Grand Duke Henri of his constitutional right to veto legislation. Why? Because he dared to oppose a new euthanasia law. Well, I guess that’s better than what Europeans used to do when they didn’t like their monarch.
But it’s not enough that individuals can now legally find ways to kill themselves. No, now people can share their final moments with millions of onlookers. Britain’s Sky Network aired a documentary that showed the final minutes of the life of Craig Ewert, an American who suffered from Lou Gehrig’s disease. Ewert paid the Swiss assisted suicide group Dignitas 3,000 pounds to help him die. He had to travel to the little Alpine nation because Switzerland is the only country that opens the maw of death—excuse me—that opens its arms to foreigners who want to kill themselves.
And then there’s the horrible case of the 19-year-old Florida man who committed suicide while some 1,500 viewers watched online. The video spread all over the Web like wildfire.
Is this where we’ve really come to? When in the course of human events have so many made death their reason for living?
As Scripture says, God has set before us life and death. And our culture is choosing death.
As we begin 2009, the Church must renew its commitment to protecting the life and true dignity of every human—from natural conception until natural death.
But despite the euphemisms of euthanasia law and suicide organizations, true human dignity is not found in death (except in cases of great self-sacrifice). It is found in life! And in Him who is the author of all life.
Amen!
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...and scr*w any personal rights or preferences!
Gondring, NOBODY is questioning your right to commit suicide.
You do seem rather obsessed with the thought of killing yourself and if I was a your psychiatrist I would probably say you need mental help.
Bookmark for later...
INDEED.
And it’s a very sad thing to see my own relatives championing such a mentality
such an evil spirit.
My husband fully expects to see the elderly encouraged to end their lives due to economic considerations... if government health care becomes the norm.
It is patently evil thinking to say the least.
“...and scr*w any personal rights or preferences!
Bull, who needs the government to hold your hand, and tax payers to foot the bill. Anyone, especially in the metro of Seattle, can end their life. People do it all the time.
The policy is bull. It’s Socialism/Communism atheism’s thinly vailed “Right to Die” ideology. You know, survival of the fittest.
Every life is precious. If a person is determined to end it, no one can stop him.
Our culture bagan the suicide process with the ‘08 vote.
Once we killed our young, anything was possible.
Sadly, this is true....and I always thought that the USA was better than that. ;-(
First of all, you're the one who wants to bring government in. I want government OUT, allowing physicians and anyone to obtain or give the materials and assistance necessary for patients to sail their own course.
Anyone, especially in the metro of Seattle, can end their life. People do it all the time.
I suppose you were having fun laughing at George Lane, the disabled man who crawled up the Polk County, Tennessee, courthouse steps once for an appearance in a reckless driving case, but was arrested for "failure to appear" when he refused to crawl up to court a second time. "Anyone can climb those stairs. People do it all the time," you mocked, eh?
I suppose you shout at the degeneratively ill, "You'd better off yourself while you can! If you wait until you're too weak to do it yourself, you're stuck!"
I suppose your ghoulish laughter echoes off walls coated with gore from those who had to use a .357 when they couldn't get Seconal...or your haunting mockery carries down hallways, as twisted, cyanide-choked bodies are carried out when more humane methods are blocked.
Maybe in your leftist, state-control-loving mind, these are mere theoreticals, but to some of us, they are real--as concrete as the people (not just some abstract, faceless "lives" in agony) involved.
Every life is precious.
I suppose that's why you want to control them all.
I agree. Once we started disrespecting the wishes of patients themselves, the snowball started downhill.
I am very sorry to hear that. Certainly a cross to bear.
The elderly are now drugged to a catatonic state where their fragile bodies go into shut down.
Without the yoke of Christianity, mankind with no concern for human life will be homicidal and suicidal.
Good to hear, but that's only part of the question. Many people hang onto life as long as possible, figuring they can always end it later, only to discover that they are unable to do without assistance so by the time they choose that path.
What do we want, people to have to kill themselves sooner, just because they can't get help if they wait?
That's sick; we shouldn't have policies that promote that.
You do seem rather obsessed with the thought of killing yourself and if I was a your psychiatrist I would probably say you need mental help.
Hmmm...doesn't esem very logical. If I had a psychiatrist, wouldn't that imply that I already had mental help? Try again...Being a patriotic American fighting against government intrustion is not a mental disorder.
Funny how mankind made it for so long without Christianity if it is necessarily homicidal and suicidal by nature. Could it be that men are homicidal and suicidal by nature, but mankind as a whole has gotten through that?
Besides, it was hundreds of years before Christianity changed from being okay with suicide into banning it. Early Christians committed suicide or sought martyrdom to be with their Lord. It wasn't until the Council of Braga (c. 561-563) that it was banned. (This pronouncement was along with other such enlightenments as excommunicating priests who wouldn't eat their vegetables in meat broth.)
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