Posted on 11/29/2006 11:20:06 PM PST by Mr. Silverback
England’s prestigious and influential Nuffield Council on Bioethics has recommended that babies born before twenty-two weeks be given no special treatment to save their lives. Claiming to have the “best interests” of these babies at heart, the Council stated—and read this carefully: “We view [the baby’s] interests in living or dying, or in avoiding an ‘intolerable’ life . . . as more important than the interests that others may have in any significant decisions made about him or her”—like parents, I guess. If babies are born after twenty-two weeks, the Council said, intensive care should be given only if both doctors and parents agree on it.
This is frightening enough. But what’s even more frightening are some of the factors that went into this decision.
As reported on our blog, The Point, organizations around England weighed in to help the Council develop these recommendations. One of those organizations was the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecology, who called for “active euthanasia” of disabled babies.
Then the Church of England entered the fray. But if you thought that they got involved to speak up for the lives of the defenseless, you’d be wrong. Instead, they backed up the obstetricians and gynecologists—the ones who were saying that a disabled and painful life was not worth living. Although it didn’t actually advocate euthanasia, the church’s statement did call for the withholding of treatment for premature babies “in some circumstances . . . knowing it will possibly, probably, or even certainly result in death.”
Here we have a chilling close-up view of how far the culture of death has advanced. To whom should human life be more sacred than to the Church and to the medical community? But in this case both have turned their backs on the human lives most in need of protection. Of course they claim to be doing this in the “best interests” of the infants and their families. But if these guidelines are officially adopted, just wait until a case comes up in which the child could survive with treatment, and the parents want that treatment. I guarantee you we’ll be informed that death rather than disability is in the child’s “best interest.”
In fact, we don’t have to wait. Look at the case of Charlotte Wyatt, born premature and disabled in Portsmouth, England. Her parents were forced to wage a major battle against the doctors for her life. Charlotte is now three, and the media uses words like tragic to refer to her case—despite the fact that, though disabled, she’s still alive. A good sign of where the media’s priorities are, isn’t it? Just as with Terri Schiavo, the disabled life is seen as inconvenient to others and so not worth living.
But this is not about convenience, not about what’s easy or painless. It is about the sacredness and the dignity of human life made in the image of God. That the Anglican Church has discarded that truth should concern us all profoundly because if we can’t trust the Body of Christ to hold human life sacred, who can we trust? And don’t just write this off as, “Well, it’s the Brits.” So often what happens in England soon finds its way here.
There are links to further information at the source document.
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My grandson weighed 2 pounds, 10 ounces. At 14, he is pushing 6 feet, lifting weights, doing great in high school, got young ladies chasing him around, and I'd guess he's pleased that we didn't just put him in a corner and let him die. I sure am!
I started reading Colson's "Born Again" yesterday. It's quite a journey, from Richard Nixon's hatchet man to leading Christian writer.
The UK in big moral trouble...
Does this dual endorsement by the Royal College and the C. of E. presage an equally poisonous finding by groups in the US?
My how the mighty are fallen! Both America and Great Britain are, in the words of Christian rock musician Kemper Crabb {of ArkAngel and later, RadioHalo} "drowning underneath a sea of blood..."
May G_d have mercy on our nations and the souls of the innocent...
A.A.C.
"Danny DeVito, please report to the disintegrator."
This is criminally insane. I have read where the bones of very early man have been unearthed, showing healed injuries of a nature that would render life "intolerable," yet these unfortunates were cared for at great expense to the clan's meager paleolithic resources and kept alive, and finally buried with honor. And now it seems that we civilized sophisticates place ourselves beneath the Neanderthals in ethics and morality!
C.S. Lewis warned that post-Christian societies would be worse than any pagan society, because such nations have had Christ and specifically rejected Him.
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Indeed. I've always believed that those who've never heard the Word but lived as He would want them to will be saved. Possibly a belief not in line with some religions, but nonetheless my belief in my most merciful Father.
Those that know Him and turn away are still available to His mercy, but that will be up to Him and their actions.
FMCDH(BITS)
Good thing I was born in 1954: after birth, my doctor told my mother that I was mentally retarded (my older kids will probably second that diagnosis, while my youngest still thinks I'm the smartest man in the world).
Who knows what would have happened in today's (enlightened) environment?
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