Last month, an expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada, chaired by Udo Schuklenk, a professor of bioethics at Queens University, released a report on decision-making at the end of life. The report provides a strong argument for allowing doctors to help their patients to die, provided that the patients are competent and freely request such assistance.
The ethical basis of the panel’s argument is not so much the avoidance of unnecessary suffering in terminally ill patients, but rather the core value of individual autonomy or self-determination. “The manner of our dying,” the panel concludes, “reflects our sense of what is important just as much as do the other central decisions in our lives.” In a state that protects individual rights, therefore, deciding how to die ought to be recognized as such a right.
The report also offers an up-to-date review of how assistance by physicians in ending life is working in the “living laboratories” – the jurisdictions where it is legal. In Switzerland, as well as in the American states of Oregon, Washington and Montana, the law now permits physicians, on request, to supply a terminally ill patient with a prescription for a drug that will bring about a peaceful death. In The Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg, doctors have the additional option of responding to the patient’s request by giving the patient a lethal injection.
Yes, I remember Archbishop Peter Jensen of Sydney in one of his Presidential addresses to synod (IIRC) highlighted an Australian ethicist who made the same claim – that the idea of the sanctity of life was an outdated ethical idea, and instead the right of individual autonomy is the foundation.
We can all tremble if this one wins, but particularly the poor, the disadvantaged, the disabled, the aged, and those who aren’t the ‘beautiful’ people. This is an ethical principle by ‘strong’ people and for ‘strong’ people. Only they have a hope of taking advantage of a society based around the absolute right of self-determination. Everyone else will just have to hope that they don’t get in their way. As always, Nietzsche was more or less in the right ballpark, even if he painted things in somewhat flamboyant colors. Masters and the herd, here we come in small, autonomy-affirming, steps.
I suppose I could concede the point, if, and it’s a big if, the person giving up their life, gave him/her self that life in the first place.
But you do not give yourself life. Your life is a gift given you from outside your self.
… and as St Paul says, “you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Our mission as the Church is to bring all people to the death to which St Paul refers so that they can be brought to a new life that’s to be lived entirely for God. Thus to terminate your own life is to cut short whatever God has in mind for you to do in his Name and for his kingdom.
Pope John Paul II spoke of, “the dignity of suffering”. This was obviously not the same thing as, “exhaust all measures” — which he did not do. Of course, the dignity of suffering cuts right across the grain of autonomy at all costs. The problem is whether a society that is programmatically secular can continue to acknowledge life, wisdom, and character as gifts, grace, and not self-legislated. Given secular presuppositions, the “moving” column is the last word on human dignity.
Just one of the Devil’s issues we are fighting here (“Physician Assisted Suicide”) this legislative session.
I concur that this is evil. However, if we might for a moment stipulate that the secular society around us is likely to approve this more widely as time goes on, would it be any use at all to advocate for a separation of functions? It would seem that a separate class of medical personnel should be charged with carrying out life-ending duties from those giving life-sustaining care. That might at least offer some protection to the very vulnerable from the huge opportunities for exploitation, abuse and profit. Creation of advocates for life in the decision-making process must surely be a small mitigating good and not to be despised. In our present society we seem to be more effective when we witness for the good and seek to convert rather than enforce. Or am I wrong?
I think the idea is worth considering Frank Fuller, my immediate thought is that it will create a group of people whose financial interest lies in ensuring that euthanasia, and medico assisted suicide, remains live and well. It’s a follow the money kind of thing – under your scheme this group’s sole job would be to medically kill people. I’m not sure that would necessarily help protect people to have people whose job security (or possibly take home pay) depends on them helping kill a certain number of people, or make it easy to get rid of this when the tide turned away from it – these people would form a professional body whose vested interest lay in keeping the practice. But others might see some ways to get the separation of powers strengths without those weaknesses.
It just seems to me that having to place yourself in the care of perfect strangers to kill you ups the ante, and meanwhile means there is not a “divided loyalty” in those who are giving you life-sustaining care. I already watch with interest how often practitioners resist referrals to hospice; perhaps the same sort of thing might work well for helping to defend life-affirming courses of treatment. The higher the bar society sets the choice the more protection for the weak and vulnerable.
Br Michael:[blockquote] But you do not give yourself life. Your life is a gift given you from outside your self. [/blockquote]
But surely, if someone gives you something, it becomes yours? And you are then entitled to do what you want with it. Which might include destroying it, or even giving it back to the person who gave it to you.
And in war-time, some soldiers lay down their lives for thier comrades by making ‘suicidal’ attacks on the enemy, and they are accorded the highest military honours for so doing. Nobody condemns them for deliberately giving up the gift of life.
Or look at Captain Oates, who chose certain death in the Antarctic by walking off into a blizzard in an attempt to save his comrades’ lives. That was suicide. But as Jesus said, [i]”Greater Love Hath No Man Than This, That a Man Lay Down His Life For His Friends”[/i].
So it’s evidently not always a sin to lay down one’s life.
#8 — There are important differences between physician assisted suicide and hospice. Medical resistance to hospice is, to my mind, very problematic — futile medical care is anything but “life-affirming” and a threat to our health-care.
#10, I entirely agree–nothing in my notes should be taken as any kind of doubt of the value of hospice care. Forgive if I misled with my comment. I can see how hospices might be co-opted by the PAS/euthanasia advocates as the vehicle for their agenda, but that has never been my experience. I don’t think PAS should have a place in either hospitals or hospices, if and when it comes to public acceptance.
9. A loan then. And as you well know we are not talking about the sacrifice of one life for another, rather we are talking about killing people who, for what ever reason want to take their lives and want others to assist them in doing so. They can’t give life so they take it and it is not theirs to take.
#9 — Sacrificing your life for another is not “suicide” at all and is not and has never been referred to as such. Suicide is when a person’s intention is to kill themself. They want their life to end and they take deliberate steps to bring this about. A mother who sees her child in the street and rushes out to push the child out of the way of a speeding car and is herself hit and killed has not committed suicide and at no time in the history of the English language has the word applied to such a situation. Basic dictionary definition.
For Bishop Nazir-Ali’s response see: http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2012/01/let-us-care-for-the-ill-and-vulnerable-not-help-them-to-die.html
As British commenter Viv Evans noted:
[blockquote]It is interesting that those here who agree with a law for assisted suicide speak only of how they, themselves, wish to die, and that nothing should interfere with their right.
Oddly enough, they don’t seem to grasp that the law of unintended consequences means that this right to assisted suicide will mean in practice that it isn’t they who have a say, it is the medical bureaucracy.
Nobody can be unaware of the way our elderly are treated in our hospitals.
I wonder if they were so keen on this ‘right’ if they were told by the box-ticking, target-fulfilling decision makers that their time is up, at age 80+, even if they only have a chest infection (curable) or a broken limb (treatable), and are compos mentis?
And do we really want to live in a society where the elderly, with or without Alzheimers, are regarded as useless ‘human resource’ which is best done away with?
If that is acceptable, then why shouldn’t we re-introduce capital punishment? After all, keeping prisoners locked up for long stretches of time is also a waste of scace resources, isn’t it … [/blockquote]
Br. Michael:
[blockquote]9. A loan then. [/blockquote]That doesn’t make much difference. If somebody lends me something, I can return it whenever I want. I’m not obliged to keep it until they demand it back.
[blockquote]And as you well know we are not talking about the sacrifice of one life for another,[/blockquote]Sure, but I’m establishing the fact that in some circumstances suicide isn’t sinful. Jesus said so. So there is no blanket condemnation of suicide, it depends on the circumstances.
[blockquote]we are talking about killing people…[/blockquote]As far as I know, people don’t kill other people in these places; the patient controls the mechanism and physically initiates the procedure.They’re suicide clinics, not homicide clinics.
No. Jesus did not say that suicide is not sinful. You just made up a definition of suicide that is not to be found in any English dictionary in existence, and then put the defintion back into Jesus’s mouth. Perhaps you would like to say that Jesus committed suicide, but he did not. Suicide means “self killing.” Jesus did not kill himself. Nor did anyone in the examples you gave of “laying down his life for another.” Please cite a single definition of suicide which supports your made up use of the word.
Hi Catholic Mom. I’m happy to use your Catholic definitions, if you like. The New Advent Encyclopedia [url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14326b.htm]describes suicide[/url] as being either positive or negative, and as direct or indirect.
So, an American soldier who goes on a suicide mission, where death is not sought but neverthess almost certain – that’s positive, indirect suicide.
Whereas a Japanese kamikaze pilot committed positive, direct suicide, because his death was an integral part of the plan.
Captain Oates committed negative direct suicide.
In each case, a man lays down his life for his friends, as Jesus endorsed as the greatest love. (Though Jesus wouldn’t have endorsed the Japanese nation’s general mindset of that time, of course.)
[blockquote]Perhaps you would like to say that Jesus committed suicide,[/blockquote]I hadn’t thought about it, but it’s an interesting question. By these Catholic definitions, I’d say he did. He came to Earth with the intention of being executed, he acted in ways that he knew would lead to him being executed, and he refused to evade or stop his execution – which he could easily have done, given his miraculous powers.
That would be a negative, direct suicide.
[blockquote] A mother who sees her child in the street and rushes out to push the child out of the way of a speeding car and is herself hit and killed has not committed suicide and at no time in the history of the English language has the word applied to such a situation.[/blockquote]Nice straw-man you demolished there. You’re quite right, nobody would describe that as a suicide, because it would be a split-second decision made instinctively, with no time to consider the risks or consequences. Any death would be deemed accidental, not suicidal.
Whereas Captain Oates defintely understood the consequences of leaving the tent. He knew he was walking to his certain death, he was killing himself as surely as if he’d eaten cyanide. He laid down his life for his friends, and is thus honoured to this day as a hero.
Hmm, I personally think that a number 1 mission of each doctor who once took the oath is to encourage his patients to life, instead of just sitting and looking at how they die (even if they claim that their decision to leave life was voluntary). To my mind, it’s almost a crime not to try to prevent death…Human life, no matter how difficult it may be, is a precious gift of God that we all should keep. There are things, such as [b][url=http://ameriloansearch.com/]loans with no credit check[/url][/b] that can make your life better.
Clever that you didn’t actually include the quote:
[blockquote] Suicide is direct when a man has the intention of causing his own death, whether as an end to be attained, or as a means to another end, as when a man kills himself to escape condemnation, disgrace, ruin etc. It is indirect, and not usually called by this name when a man does not desire it, either as an end or as a means, but when he nevertheless commits an act which in effect involves death, as when he devotes himself to the care of the plague-stricken knowing that he will succumb under the task.
[/blockquote]
“It is indirect AND NOT USUALLY CALLED BY THIS NAME when…” The Church is clearly distinguishing what is commonly called “suicide” and which is a sin from what is NOT commonly called “suicide” and is NOT a sin which is “laying down your life for another.” The whole point of the article is to refute exactly what you’re saying. That it is NOT suicide, for example, to be in a situation of famine in Ireland and to give up your own share of food for your children, knowing that, if you don’t eat you will eventually whereas it is actually committing suicide when the goal and intention is your death. In all of the cases that you called “suicide” — if divine intervention were to occur such that it were no longer necessary — suddenly food became available, suddenly the grenade was deactivated, etc. — the person would be incredibly happy because it was never their goal to die — merely to save others. Whereas the true “suicide” when thwarted, will be annoyed and merely pick another occasion to carry out their intention.
No matter whether or not you cling to the fact that there is a theological definition of “indirect suicide” (which the article makes clear is a technical theological definition and not the common English use of the word) all of your comments are still totally irrelevant to this thread which is a discussion of “direct” suicide (commonly called “suicide”). And it is clearly an act which Jesus never praised or commended.
On the ACTUAL topic of this thread (as opposed to the red herring introduced by Gnu Ordure) I don’t feel that I can personally condemn anyone who is in such physical or mental agony that they feel that can’t go on another minute. Not that I agree with their decision to kill themselves, but since I am not in their position, I don’t feel I can judge them.
But the problem is that we live in a culture that continually lowers the bar for how much “suffering” is tolerable in a life. Most people, if they were forced to live the kinds of lives lived by almost everybody just a few hundred years ago, would probably say that life was intolerable. Whether Confucian philosophy, Native American stoicism, or Christian theology, human cultures have, for thousands of years, taught that suffering is a part of life that has to be accepted and dealt with honorably. But now we’re told — your body should be perfect, you should be forever young and healthy and beautiful, your life should be wonderful, you should have a “life partner” who provides you with love and support, you should have a loving family surrounding you, you should have fulfilling and meaningful employment (and enriching hobbies as well). And on and on. And if you don’t, then your life has seriously gone off the track and you must be suffering terribly.
Now, I’m not talking about somebody who is in the end stages of cancer or somebody who has Lou Gehrig’s disease (although even there, there is a message, which is now almost completely lost, that there is a dignity and meaning in life even at the very end). But there is a slippery slope from “it’s reasonable to end your life because you are dying painfully of cancer” (not that I agree with that to begin with, but it could be understood) to “it’s reasonable to end your life because you are old or handicapped or without family or without work or whatever else our society says is fundamentally required for a “good” life.”
The Christian message is that every life is a “good” life. It’s always interesting to me to compare the message of the Pete Singers of the world with respect to euthanizing (or “letting die”) seriously handicapped infants (basically we’re doing them a favor) and the message of seriously handicapped people themselves (“thanks for the thought, but we actually value our own lives.”) The message of Christianity is that God values ALL lives infinitely and it is not up to us to judge whose life is worth living and whose is not (including our own).
Gnu Ordure, if you’re the same guy with ‘Gnu’ in his name that I’ve seen here and on Stand Firm from time to time, I don’t think I’ve ever seen your thinking so estranged from classical theological and ethical thinking. I think Catholic Mom has brought out the (fairly obvious) problem with your thinking on the meaning of ‘suicide’. But I’m still staggered at this:
[blockquote]But surely, if someone gives you something, it becomes yours? And you are then entitled to do what you want with it. Which might include destroying it, or even giving it back to the person who gave it to you.[/blockquote]
Yes, that’s true in the abstract, a gift [i]can[/i] be like that in [i]certain kinds of givings[/i]. But where does Scripture suggest that that is what [i]God’s[/i] gifts are like? Where does a Biblical text go anything like: “God gave you this, so it’s yours now and you are entitled to do whatever you want with it – use it, misuse, destroy it, give it back.”? God’s gift of the land to Israel? Discussion of spiritual gifts in 1 Cor? Parable of the talents? Don’t all these work along the lines that Br. Michael was alluding to – it’s a gift so [i]therefore[/i] there are obligations in how you use it.
In fact Luke 12:48 “To whom much is given much will be required” implies almost the exact [i]opposite[/i] ethical principle to the one you’ve articulated.
There are things common between God’s giving and ours, but there are features unique to God’s gifts. And chief among those is that God gives himself in his gifts in a way that creatures cannot. The gift of life is not separate from the One who is Life. Theologically, your principle would only work if deism was correct, and God’s works have nothing of God in them.
Hi Catholic Mom.
[blockquote]all of your comments are still totally irrelevant to this thread which is a discussion of “direct†suicide (commonly called “suicideâ€). [/blockquote]No, it’s not a matter of direct equals wrong. Two of the three examples I gave of someone laying down their lives for their friends were direct suicides. The Encyclopedia itself seems confused on this point, because in the part you quoted about direct suicide, the only examples it gives of possible ends beyond death itself are dishonourable ones:
[blockquote]Suicide is direct when a man has the intention of causing his own death, whether as an end to be attained, or as a means to another end, as when a man kills himself to escape condemnation, disgrace, ruin etc. [/blockquote]It fails to mention honourable ends such as I’ve mentioned – saving one’s friends (Capt. Oates), killing one’s enemies (the kamikaze pilot) – or the more neutral end of escaping from severe chronic pain (a hypothetical subject of this thread).
The Encyclopedia then goes on to condemn direct suicide (positive and negative) unequivocally. According to them, Capt. Oates was a sinner, not a hero. I disagree. What’s your judgment of him, Catholic Mom?
The point I’m making is that it’s not logical to say that people should not commit suicide because their lives belong to God, and so they don’t have the right to choose to end it – whilst allowing and exalting other people (Capt. Oates) to do just that, when they ‘lay down their lives for their friends’.
[blockquote]In all of the cases that you called “suicideâ€â€”if divine intervention were to occur such that it were no longer necessary—suddenly food became available, suddenly the grenade was deactivated, etc.—the person would be incredibly happy because it was never their goal to die—merely to save others. Whereas the true “suicide†when thwarted, will be annoyed and merely pick another occasion to carry out their intention. [/blockquote]Not necessarily. If our example of a ‘true’ suicide is a person enduring extremely severe chronic pain, then they don’t really want to die either; what they want is to escape their pain. If divine intervention removed their pain, their desire to die would disappear. But in the absense of divine intervention, or a medical breakthrough, they may decide to kill themselves, not as an end in itself, but as a means of ending their pain.
[blockquote]I don’t feel that I can personally condemn anyone who is in such physical or mental agony that they feel that can’t go on another minute. Not that I agree with their decision to kill themselves, but since I am not in their position, I don’t feel I can judge them. [/blockquote]
Your Church judges them. It says they’re committing an “atrocious crime” and refuses them a Christian burial (according to that article).
[blockquote]The Christian message is that every life is a “good†life. [/blockquote]Yet some people’s lives are truly awful, and they don’t want to live any more. It’s logical and normal to want intense pain to stop. And I think people should decide for themselves how much pain they can stand. Whereas you Christians insist that all pain must be endured, no matter how excruciating. I find your attitude lacking in compassion.
Hi Mark.
[blockquote] Gnu Ordure, if you’re the same guy with ‘Gnu’ in his name that I’ve seen here and on Stand Firm from time to time, I don’t think I’ve ever seen your thinking so estranged from classical theological and ethical thinking.[/blockquote]Yes, I did post at SF for a while, but I don’t recall discussing suicide.
As regards my ethical thinking on the subject, why do you think I’m estranged? I assure you that as a psychotherapist I spend a significant proportion of my working life thinking and talking about suicide. I assess the suicide risk of four or five new patients every week. And if one of my patients becomes suicidal, I do everything I can to stop them killing themselves, up to and including having them sectioned ie locked up in a mental hospital.
Yet…. sometimes the desire to kill oneself is logical and reasonable. The patient states that their life is intolerable, the physical pain is too severe. In which case, I would support their decision.
[blockquote]Yes, that’s true in the abstract, a gift can be like that in certain kinds of givings. [/blockquote]I have no idea what you mean by ‘certain kinds of givings’. You have X. You offer X to me as a gift. If there are strings attached to the gift, you should tell me what they are, so that I can make an informed decision. I then decide whether to accept the gift, or not.
If there are no strings attached, then I can accept and do what I want with X. You gave it to me, it’s now mine.
[blockquote]it’s a gift so [i]therefore[/i] there are obligations in how you use it. [/blockquote]No, that’s a gift with strings attached. A true gift has no strings. and nothing is owed as a result.
[blockquote]There are things common between God’s giving and ours, but there are features unique to God’s gifts. And chief among those is that God gives himself in his gifts in a way that creatures cannot. [/blockquote]Please explain more about this ‘way’ of giving.
[blockquote] The gift of life is not separate from the One who is Life. [/blockquote]I understand that those are your beliefs.
[blockquote] I assure you that as a psychotherapist I spend a significant proportion of my working life thinking and talking about suicide. I assess the suicide risk of four or five new patients every week. And if one of my patients becomes suicidal, I do everything I can to stop them killing themselves, up to and including having them sectioned ie locked up in a mental hospital. [/blockquote]
Ah yes, so you actually have no problem understanding exactly what the word “suicide” means. 🙂 I’m going to guess that not one of your patients is afflicted with a desire to volunteer to help others in dangerous parts of their world where they might be killed. I’ll go so far as to say that when one of them says “doctor, I want to kill myself” you don’t say “well, that can indeed be very commendable — I believe Jesus himself commends it” because you know exactly what they mean.
The question is — what are you able to offer them in terms of convincing them that they should NOT kill themselves? Frankly, if this world is all there is and we are all just various lumps of cheap chemicals organized by some strands of double-helixed nucleic acids and if it seems to us that we no longer want to be so organized and would prefer to let our cheap chemicals return to the environment, then why on earth would anyone try to talk us out of it? Even going to the extent of locking us up? Hey, I myself cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would want to listen to Wagner, but I certainly wouldn’t try to stop someone from going to a Wagner festival. Even if I were convinced that their desire to listen to Wagner stemmed from a fundamental mental or neurochemical defect. It’s their life. If they want to listen Wagner, go right ahead. Same for killing themselves. Now if they came to me and said “I feel like listening to Wagner, but please talk me out of it” that would be a different story. But if they truly want to listen to Wagner (or kill themselves) other than arguing that they have some obligation to others not to (“Think of the poor ushers who have to listen to it too.” / “Think of your children.”) You have absolutely nothing to offer anyone who wants to kill themselves as a reason why they shouldn’t.
Hi Catholic Mom. With respect, I think discussing how psychiatrists, psychologists and psychotherapists treat suicidal ideation would be going further off-topic. But, lots of effective treatments are available. If you want a basic overview, this American Family Physician [url=http://www.aafp.org/afp/1999/0315/p1500.html]article[/url] seems OK.
I’m not talking about how you “treat” “suicidal ideation.” For all I know you could have a wonderful little pill and you give it someone and all of a sudden they don’t want to kill themselves. I said you have nothing to offer them in terms of a logical argument why they shouldn’t. In fact, you’ve spent this entire thread arguing that 1) your life is your own 2) you can do with as you please 3) sometimes suicide can be a positive good. And, from your perspective, all these are completely true. Thus, you may have hundreds of “treatments” to keep someone from killing themselves, but no logical reason whatsoever for doing so.
Catholic Mom, I still don’t see how this is relevant to the OP. And I note that you haven’t replied at all to my last quite lengthy post to you, #21, preferring to pursue this red herring.
But to answer your question, as briefly as I can:
[blockquote]In fact, you’ve spent this entire thread arguing that 1) your life is your own 2) you can do with [it] as you please 3) sometimes suicide can be a positive good. And, from your perspective, all these are completely true… [/blockquote]Agreed.
[blockquote]… Thus, you may have hundreds of “treatments†to keep someone from killing themselves, but no logical reason whatsoever for doing so. [/blockquote]That’s a non-sequitur. Many suicidal people are thinking irrationally and illogically. They may be deluded, psychotic, cllincally depressed or suffering some other mental disorder. They may be under the influence of drink or drugs. Or merely suffering a teenage heart-break for the first time. Or suffering a severe bereavement.
In all these cases, therapy and/or medication can help the person deal with their problems, with the result that they no longer feel suicidal. At which point, they may express relief and gratitude that they have been pulled back from the edge.
So in my opinion, the vast majority of suicides are not ‘positive and good’. They are avoidable tragedies. And as a psychotherapist, I do everything I can to stop those tragedies. I have counselled dozens of suicidal patients in my twenty-two years of practice; I’m happy to say that none of them went on to kill themselves. And I have a couple of treasured letters from patients thanking me for saving their lives.
So evidently, Catholic Mom, I do have something to offer my patients, in spite of my atheism.
And none of this detracts from my point that in a very few cases, suicide is logical and reasonable.
Your post #21 was the red herring because it has nothing to do with the real topic of this thread and is a waste of time to continue pursuing.
I didn’t say you didn’t have anything to “offer” your patients. Not at all. Some of them you’ve “cured” (from your perspective and from their current perspective.) That’s not what I said. I said you don’t have a single good reason why they shouldn’t kill themselves except that you think they shouldn’t. If they were suffering horribly from a physical disorder, you might actually think they should. Why is it a “tragedy” (from your perspective) that they kill themselves? (Other than pain it may cause other people?)
Some people like Justin Bieber. Some don’t. Your reasons for liking Justin Bieber may be irrational, it may be the result of the fact that you’re depressed, it may be the result of a lifetime of bad musical training, it may even be the result of organic brain disease. Still, they are your reasons and and the only justification I would have for intervening in any way would be if you said “I really hate Justin Bieber, but I can’t stop listening to him. Can you help?” But there is not ultimate rightness or wrongness to liking Justin Bieber.
Somebody comes to you and tells you that they want to kill themselves. Why on earth don’t you just let them alone to do what they want? They fact is, you have internalized a belief that human life is sacred and of infinite value, but you can’t say those things and in fact you argue against them. But you are then unable to articulate WHY someone who truly wants to kill themselves shouldn’t be left alone to do it.
CM,
[blockquote]Your post #21 was the red herring because it has nothing to do with the real topic of this thread [/blockquote]
It was all about the morality of suicide; I’m not sure how you think that’s off-topic. Like this::
[i]The point I’m making is that it’s not logical to say that people should not commit suicide because their lives belong to God, and so they don’t have the right to choose to end it – whilst allowing and exalting other people (Capt. Oates) to do just that, when they ‘lay down their lives for their friends’.[/i] Or:
[i] It’s logical and normal to want intense pain to stop. And I think people should decide for themselves how much pain they can stand. Whereas you Christians insist that all pain must be endured, no matter how excruciating. I find your attitude lacking in compassion.[/i]
Tell me, Catholic Mom, do you think suicide and attempted suicide should be criminal offences, as serious as murder and attempted murder?
[blockquote] Somebody comes to you and tells yn ou that they want to kill themselves. Why on earth don’t you just let them alone to do what they want?[/blockquote]Because they came to me. Therefore I’m obliged to try to help them. And presumably at least part of their psyche wants help, otherwise they wouldn’t have come to me in the first place.