Free Republic

Udo Schuklenk, who was the chair of the one-sided Royal Society of Canada: End of Life Decision Making panel, is now proselytizing his philosophy (or Peter Singer's philosophy) promoting euthanasia for newborns and infanticide. Schuklenk uses quality-of-life arguments to support his eugenic philosophy to encourage the killing of newborns with disabilities.In an article published in The Journal of Thoracie and Cardiovascular Surgery, titled: Physicians can justifiably euthanize certain severely impaired neonates, Schuklenk argues that some lives are not worth living and that parents should have the right to decide to end the lives of newborns with disabilities. Schuklenk states: A quality-of-life ethic requires us to...

Brittany Maynard was clearly working with the pro-assisted suicide group Compassion and Choices when she took a lethal drug to end her life and released a video in conjunction with the euthanasia group about her decision.Now a new revelation has come out about the extent to which Maynard worked with and had contact with assisted suicide activists in the time leading up to her killing herself. A new report indicates she emailed a woman who illegally provided lethal drugs to her own father that he used to take his life.A People magazine report indicates Maynard, the day she committed suicide,...

Earlier this year, Dr. Wim Distelmans raised eyebrows when it was revealed that he was organizing a euthanasia tour of Auschwitz, a venue that he called “inspiring” — not entirely surprising when you practice the art of dealing death, as Distelmans is.His trip has now concluded, with about 70 people attending, most of whom practice euthanasia in Belgium. Protests surrounded the trip, and especially Distelmans himself. The German publication Der Spiegel described the trip this way: That evening, the group checks into the Hilton Garden Inn Hotel. In the marble lobby there is a sign that reads “Dying with...

Human logic goes where our first principles and fundamental premises take it. Assisted suicide’s core premise is that being killed to stop suffering is a fundamental human right. In other words, terminal illness may sometimes be politically expedient entry point to euthanasialand, but it isn’t the point of legalization.And now, in the journal Bioethics, bioethicist Roland Kipke argues that if assisted suicide is a right of autonomy, we should permit entrepreneurs to go into the business of making people painlessly dead, what he calls “commercially-assisted suicide” (CAS). From, “Why Not Commercial Assistance for Suicide?”:  ‘CAS’ means that persons who wish to commit suicide are supported in a businesslike fashion,...

Strasbourg, France • Pope Francis on Tuesday urged European leaders to reject a "throwaway culture" that treats people like "cogs in a machine" too easily discarded through abortion and euthanasia. Francis made the comments Tuesday to the European Parliament during a brief visit meant to highlight his vision for Europe a quarter-century after St. John Paul II travelled to Strasbourg to address a continent still divided by the Iron Curtain. In a highly critical address amid tight security, Francis blamed "selfish lifestyles" and "uncontrolled consumerism" for promoting alienation and indifference to the poor during a time of economic crisis....

Specialists from several Dutch medical schools have prepared a document that is to serve as official guidelines for organ donation after euthanasia, and aims to facilitate the procedure. Doctors expect the legal framework to step up the number of organ donations, which up to now have been few and far between: 6 cases in 16 years, less than in neighboring Belgium. It will help people who choose euthanasia to give a “meaning” to their death, the guidelines’ authors suggest.Up until now, organ donation after euthanasia has been a very marginal practice for several reasons, the first being that killing of...

Shortly after Brittany Maynard took her own life, a leading Catholic Church official said assisted suicide was “reprehensible” because it violated the dignity of human life. Monsignor Ignacio Carrasco de Paula, the head of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said “dignity is something other than putting an end to one’s own life,” when asked about Maynard’s decision to kill herself. Carrasco de Paula said “Brittany Maynard’s act is in itself reprehensible, but what happened in the consciousness we do not know.” brittanymaynardHe cautioned that he was not judging individuals “but the gesture in and of itself should be condemned.”...

The death by intentional dehydration of Nancy Fitzmaurice, a 12 year-old child with significant disabilities in the UK, is clearly a case of euthanasia by dehydration and not a case of withdrawing medical treatment. I have a relative who lives with a very similar condition to Nancy, a condition that developed in a similar manner. The British case, that became known when an article was published in the Daily Mirror on October 25, 2014, is based on a decision by Justice Eleanor King in August, to approve the withdrawal of hydration and nutrition from Nancy. This case set a terrible and dangerous...

Beware movements that word engineer and deploy gooey euphemisms to further their agenda. It generally means there is something very wrong with the agenda. In the wake of Brittany Maynard’s death, suicide promoters are now using the word “dignity” as a synonym for suicide, more than implying that dying naturally is not dignity. That is not only cruel, it is wrong. Dignity is intrinsic. Sick and dying people seeking to be assured they still have it look at us–our faces–like mirrors. If they see us thinking they are less than they once were, it can be devastating. In the Guardian, Brian Smith–obviously no relation–says his father...

 After-Birth “Abortion”    We Are In The Middle Of A Tsunami Of Physician-Hastened Termination—Goodness Has Nothing To Do With It, Don’t Call It “Euthanasia”  I watch the people’s faces coming out of Mass, the time when their lives are most affected by our Blessed Lord’s earthly mission. Sometimes my notice is caught by a heavenly glow on the faces of mothers with many children. Little children are innocently preoccupied by more immediate emotions. But most arresting are the looks of young people, often ranging between wistfulness and angst.Youth are faced with some of the most serious business of life,...

With the sad and scandalous news out of Oregon last night of Brittany Maynard’s state sanctioned suicide, thoughts turn toward the eternal consequences of such actions. The Internet and social media com boxes are full of praise and condolences for the terminally ill young woman and her grieving family. Many have offered their personal belief that Brittany is now in heaven with God who understands (and apparently condones) her decision. Even among professing Catholics there has been an incredible disconnect between what we are called to believe and what some “want” to believe. As word of her suicide was released...

'Goodbye World. Spread Good Energy': Terminal Cancer Patient, Brittany Maynard, 29, Exercises Her Right-to-Die And Takes Her Own Life Surrounded By Her Family Brittany Maynard, 29, had previously planned to legally end her life on November 1 - before she loses her battle with terminal brain cancer She died on Sunday in her Portland, Oregon home on Sunday Maynard wrote on Facebook: 'Goodbye to all my dear friends and family' Added that she had 'a ring of support' around her as she typed Was diagnosed in April and doctors gave her just six months to live She then made headlines...

It’s November 1, the day Brittany Maynard vowed to kill herself. The 29-year-old California woman says she no longer finds life worth living after being diagnosed this past spring with stage 4 glioblastoma, a malignant brain tumor. Brittany has become the poster girl for “Compassion & Choices, ” a so-called “end-of-life choice” advocacy organization that is fighting to increase the number of stateS with so-called “Death With Dignity” laws on the books. The model is Oregon, the state to which Brittany relocated this past summer because her home state of California doesn’t allow physician-assisted suicide (at least for now). Oregon...

Once the pinnacle of civilization, the UK has succumbed to the culture of death once again.  A mother was granted a petition to kill her own twelve year-old daughter, who was not dying of a terminal disease, not on life support, and not able communicate her wishes. If you’re ill and unhappy, or just unhappy with life, death is the answer, according to supporters of euthanasia.  Dying by your own choice is all the rage in Belgium, with a 27% increase in doctor-assisted suicides in the last year.  Both Belgium and the Netherlands have legalized child euthanasia by the child’s...

(LiveActionNews) — The ethical problems with euthanasia have been detailed at Live Action News extensively. People with disabilities, people suffering from mental illness, people who were just lonely or old but otherwise healthy, even children — all can be euthanized in countries like Belgium and the Netherlands. That’s not good enough for the assisted suicide lobby though, which continues to campaign for the right to kill increasingly more people, from the disabled to the poor.This slippery slope is now headed for the United States, with cancer patient Brittany Maynard saying she will kill herself on November 1, and until then,...

Two stories battled for my attention recently, and both of them broke my heart. The first was about Brittany Maynard, a 29-year-old woman with brain cancer who moved from California to Oregon to gain access to legal suicide-inducing drugs. She is planning to die in bed, surrounded by her family, on Nov. 1 (the solemnity of All Saints), two days after her husband’s birthday. The second story was about the singer Glen Campbell, who decided to go public with his struggle against Alzheimer’s disease. With his children on stage with him for a final, 151-stop musical tour, and the cameras...

Politics and Religion Pt. 1 Catholic Answers published its now-famous “Voter’s Guide for Serious Catholics” back in 2004 (updated in 2006) that has now sold millions of copies with millions more having been distributed for free. In that document, for which Catholic Answers has taken a lot of flack by the way, we give guidance to Catholics in voting so that, quite frankly, Catholics will “vote like Catholics,” yet, we do much more than just that. We give instruction, in complete harmony with the teaching authority of the Church, as to the most important moral issues of our day that are politically in play....

But...She should think of her fellow sufferers. Brittany Maynard is a 29-year-old woman who learned not long after her wedding that she had an aggressive brain tumour. She has therefore announced that she has chosen to die on November 1, taking advantage of Oregon’s assisted suicide law. A video that she made with the help of the leading assisted suicide organisation in the US, Compassion and Choices, has been a huge hit on YouTube. An Australian whose wife died of a similar disease, Denis Strangman, has written her an open letter below. * * * * * I am...

Kate Allat suffered a stroke at the age of 39 and the mother spent 10 days in a coma afterwards. Now that she is past that frightful ordeal, Allat reveals in a new interview that she heard everything going on around her in her hospital room and she was fearful her life support would be turned off.Allat indicates that her mind was functioning normally during her coma but everyone around her thought she was brain-dead as she laid in her hospital bed paralyzed and unable to speak or breathe on her own. She listened in fright as medical staff discussed...

A long-term pro-euthanasia campaigner has starved herself to death over five weeks because she could not have her life ended legally.Jean Davies, 86, did not suffer from a terminal illness but said her life had become ‘intolerable’ after a series of fainting spells. She died at home in Oxford on 1 October after giving an extensive interview to the Sunday Times.Mrs Davies became involved in the right-to-die campaign as far back as the 1970s and was president of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies from 1990 to 1992 and was chair of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society UK (now...