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He’s under no obligation, even as a Catholic, to receive possibly life-extending care that he doesn’t want, or to accept operations for other conditions that may not be life-threatening or even those that are. It is not permitted to hasten his death or do something that will ensure it, but he doesn’t have to go on forever accepting treatment.

I think what concerns people here is that in the future, it’s not going to be you who is making that decision for your father, but instead it will be the government deciding what is best...for the government.

They are going to constantly reduce the care available to people. First it will be for the elderly who have multiple health problems, particularly Alzheimers, and then more and more people will somehow become expendable. And it won’t be voluntary.

Something nobody mentions in this is that such an approach also reduces the impetus to do medical research. Researches are actually working on a gene therapy approach to Alzheimers that not only halts it but reverses it, and results in animal trials have been very promising. But if it becomes the rule just to kill people with certain conditions, why bother with research and cures?

He said he doesn’t want to be on machines that keep him alive artificially when he would otherwise be dead. This is difficult for me as I’m a Roman Catholic, but these are his wishes and not mine.

The decisions you are having to make are personally difficult but there is no reason to complicate them by worrying that you will do something that is contrary to Church teaching.

As surrogate decision maker, it is licit to deny extraordinary measures that would prolong the life of one who denying from a terminal illness. Now, if you were to withhold food or fluids in order to expedite someone's death that would be something else. Likewise, with giving excessive doses of narcotics to kill them. But, for instance, if your father expressed his desire not to have surgery for a slow growing cancer like prostate cancer knowing that a complication of dementia will kill him first, there is nothing here that the Church would disagree with. This sounds a little more like your situation.

Satin, reading your posts it is clear that you are thinking this through very clear and making virtues based ethics decisions. No one in the Church can find any fault with your approach or decisions. Besides, your Dad has clearly spelled out his wishes on this. Don't make things any more complicated or gutwrenching for yourself than they already are.

He said he doesn’t want to be on machines that keep him alive artificially when he would otherwise be dead.

There's nothing unethical about this. CPR and mechanical ventilation are bridges, not really therapies in and of themselves. They buy a patient time. In certainly situations, they can become bridges to nowhere. Take the case of a patient who has suffered a particular kind of stroke and is now in respiratory failure. The options are to let the patient pass now, or to place an endotracheal tube and put the patient on a ventilator. For a maximum of two weeks attempts will be made to wean the patient from the ventilator (because the tube can't be left in for longer than that) after which point the patient will receive a surgical tracheostomy that allows the ventilator to force air through a hole in his neck. Attempts to wean the patient from the ventilator will continue. Eventually he or she may end up with a tube placed in the stomach for long term liquid feeds because they can no longer eat or drink. They will go to a nursing home and lay in bed in this state for weeks, months, or years until some other infection strikes them in their debilitated state and claims their life. Often it won't be a single infection - it'll be a series of infections that causes them to be transferred from a nursing home to the hospital, receive large central IVs, and antibiotics. They will remain in the hospital for a week or two and return to the nursing home. Weeks or months later another infection will set in and the process will repeat itself until one day the infection will be incurable and the patient dies. I would not want this fate for myself or for my loved one. Most people even today make the rational decision to avoid mechanical ventilation and CPR in this scenario without government intervention. The ones who don't are usually out for some sort of secondary gain (ie, they're stealing grandma's social security checks and want her heart beating till the very last possible moment). But this isn't what death panels will address.

>>He said he doesn’t want to be on machines that keep him alive artificially when he would otherwise be dead.

This is difficult for me as I’m a Roman Catholic, but these are his wishes and not mine.<<

The Catholic Church does not demand extraordinary measures to keep a person alive.

My Uncle is a Bishop and told us this when my Dad had cancer.