Posted on 11/01/2014 11:34:33 AM PDT by CHRISTIAN DIARIST
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 is one of five states – along with Montana, Washington, New Mexico and Vermont – that allow doctors to prescribe lethal doses of medication to patients like Brittany, diagnosed with terminal illnesses, longing for a premature death.
And Compassion & Choices has campaigns underway underway in four other states to legalize euthanasia – Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts and, of course, California (so terminally ill residents like Brittany don’t have to go all the way to Oregon to kill themselves).
If the pro-euthanasia movement succeeds in nearly doubling the number of states with “Death With Dignity” laws, it will only be a matter of time before physician-assisted suicide is routine throughout the county – like physician-assisted abortion.
Indeed, just as Planned Parenthood soft-pedals abortion as “reproductive health care,” Compassion & Choices portrays euthanasia as end-of-life “comfort and control.”
And they are shamelessly exploiting terminally ill Brittany, casting her as the face of the euthanasia movement and even setting up The Brittany Maynard Fund not to benefit her family – she and her recently-wed husband are childless – but to raise money to further Compassion & Choices’ political advocacy.
Well, as a Christ follower who this very year was a pallbearer at his 83-year-old father-in-law’s funeral, who had no moral qualms with the family’s decision not to resuscitate him when he drew his last breath, I have nothing but empathy for those who find themselves in similar situations.
But it’s one thing to allow a natural death, and quite another to actively terminate life, as in the case of euthanasia.
Indeed, God’s precious gift of life is cheapened when we send off the terminally ill, like Brittany, to a hasty death.
If we accept euthanasia today for those diagnosed with six months to live, do we accept it tomorrow for anyone with a terminal illness – cancer, Alzheimer’s, whatever – no matter how far they may be from death’s door?
Is it hard to imagine Compassion & Choices one day begging the question why the “comfort and choice” of euthanasia should be limited strictly to those with terminal illnesses?
What about those of weakened mind or sinew who feel that their quality of life has so deteriorated that death would be welcome?
And why should euthanasia be restricted to adults only? What about the infant suffering from a fatal illness? Why not put the child out of his or her misery?
Because life is sacred, as the Scripture reminds.
“Do you not know,” the Apostle Paul wrote, “that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? You are not our own. You were bought with a price.”
It's not unlike Planned Parenthood's home page, which features a photo of an attractive young woman, smiling, they'd have us imagine, right after having an abortion.
I can’t answer on behalf of God. Only He can pass true judgment.
I can promise one thing. If I did it a cheap easy cure for whatever I had would be discovered the next day.
Yes. Objectively it’s a grave evil. But we can’t know her mental state or all of the circumstances leading to her decision.
I assume she is able enough to kill herself by herself so why drag anyone else into the act?
It is the gravest of all sins, what is known as Sin against the Holy Ghost and is flat-out rejection of God. She is saying that her suffering is greater than God’s love and mercy and we all know that is not true. To think she may find salvation if she kills herself is calling God a liar. She needs our prayers.
Veni, Creator Spiritus.
If she does it, she will have done nothing which needs anyone’s forgiveness.
I cannot speak for God either, but I can see Satan smiling.
you count God as anyone?
Nobody is in a position to judge this woman. I certainly will not.
Well, if a healthy person just flat out wings it with no extenuating circumstances at all I would agree.
A person in severe, intractable, untreatable, unrelenting, intolerable pain I'm not so sure (palliative pain treatment doesn't always work). God has Mercy and Compassion.
This individual doesn't appear to be in much pain judging by her jetting around to complete the bucket list.
People contemplating suicide for any reason or for no reason do need our prayers, you are correct.
Either she has entrusted herself to Christ as Savior, or not.
If she has, all her sins are now forgiven.
If she has not, there is not forgiveness.
Thank you. I was waiting for someone to say it.
Sure do.
ok...THAT was funny. ;)
**To think she may find salvation if she kills herself is calling God a liar. She needs our prayers.**
Amen!
If she is not a Christian she doesn’t have forgiveness for anything.
It’s pretty complicated. But I think the act itself is motivated out of not wanting to go through the pain. Some compare it to hospice, but it’s not hospice. It’s not easing the pain, it’s cutting it off. Also, the doctor that administers the dose. Wouldn’t that be considered murder? Does she not want to be a burden on her family? I’ve put thought into this, and I think it would get you sent straight to hell. I think that because she could still live, the tumor could go into remission. God can’t forgive you when you’re dead, and ending your own life for any reason I think is wrong. Unless there is no choice to save lives. Take the movie Armageddon for example, somebody had to die for the world to live...in that situation I think it would be okay. It’s basically playing Russian Roulette with your soul.
“I once saw a man fall off a cliff the only handhold was a clump of grass, he must have known it wouldn’t hold.”
But he still tried. That’s what counts. I think.
Sure why not? She means well. He forgives everyone for everything, anyway, so there you are.
Only God can judge her, but humans beings can say that objectively this is a grave evil. Personally, I think she’s being manipulated and being made to feel a hero by the pro-death forces, and since she’s not somebody who has done anything notable or who was likely to have been known for anything else during her lifetime, she thinks this will get her that famous 15 minutes.
It’s very sad, really, and the people who are using her are the ones who are really going to pay for this. And even though I’m not God and I can’t judge, one thing I’m pretty confident about is that the cynics who manipulate and control publicity hungry fools like this woman are going to pay for it.
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