The ‘Commission on Assisted Dying’ is a self-appointed group that excluded from its membership anyone with a known objection to assisted suicide. In contrast, the majority of commissioners, appointed personally by Lord Falconer, were already in favour of changing the law to legitimise assisted suicide. Lord Falconer has, himself, been a leading proponent for legitimising assisted suicide, for some years.
The commission undertook a quest to find effective safeguards that could be put in place to avoid abuse of any new law legitimising assisted suicide. Unsurprisingly, given the commission’s composition, it has claimed to have found such safeguards.
Unlike the commissioners, we are unconvinced that the commission has been successful in its quest….
“The ‘Commission on Assisted Dying’ is a self-appointed group that excluded from its membership anyone with a known objection to assisted suicide.”
It seems that Anglican synodic rule and order have been replaced in Great Britain, the United States and Canada by ‘ad hoc’ groups that mysteriously form to produce ‘fait accompli’ conclusions and decisions without the benefit of the traditional synodic study, contemplation, discussion and decision making process inherent in what is called ‘episcopal order.’
The ‘ad hoc-fait accompli’ approach has been used in the recent past to achieve women’s ordination and the acceptance of sexuality outside of marriage between a man and a woman.
The sad fact is that the ‘ad hoc-fait accompli’ approach has tainted the status of women’s ordination because this controversial issue was initiated by means of an extra-legal and ad hoc process.
This process resulted in in the issue having been ‘resolved but not resolved’ and it is still a simmering schismatic point of contention.
I’m very happy to see that the CofE officially opposes legalized euthanasia. A very good sign.
(#1: I don’t think this ad hoc self-appointed commission was part of the CofE. Rather it is “advising” the parliament.)
Reply to John Boyland (#2.)
“You said,
“I’m very happy to see that the CofE officially opposes legalized euthanasia.”
True. But didn’t the Cof E also at one time support special provisions for clergy and laity that didn’t want to accept women’s ordination and female diocesans? What is the status of that support today?
But, what I am really talking about is episcopal rule. Either you have it or you don’t.
It seems that in the Anglican national churches of the industrialized nations of today, that some times you have it and sometimes “wink wink’ you don’t.
And the ‘ad hoc-fait accompli’ technique is one very effective tactic that the secular revisionists have used when they seek to further their agenda(s).
Form an ‘ad hoc’ group, develop an argument and then bring that argument into effective existence through a ‘fait accompli.’
Wink, wink. And its all over except for the resulting stunned confusion.
A Commission on Dying led by a Lord Falconer…that’s just a hilarious mental image. “Those who object should be warned my falcon my return at any moment!”