{"id":106204,"date":"2021-10-22T07:30:22","date_gmt":"2021-10-22T11:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=106204"},"modified":"2021-10-22T07:43:59","modified_gmt":"2021-10-22T11:43:59","slug":"unherd-mary-harrington-the-death-of-britains-dignity-the-assisted-dying-bill-exploits-the-rhetoric-of-compassion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=106204","title":{"rendered":"(Unherd) Mary Harrington–The death of Britain\u2019s dignity–The Assisted Dying Bill exploits the rhetoric of compassion"},"content":{"rendered":"

We largely have Christianity to thank for our faltering modern belief that human life is sacred. The ancients took a much more casual approach. Unwanted babies were abandoned to die or be rescued by strangers<\/a>: like Romulus and Remus, Rome\u2019s mythical founders, who were raised by a wolf.<\/p>\n

Much as new lives were not automatically worth preserving, taking your own life in the ancient world wasn\u2019t automatically bad either. Socrates\u2019 decision to drink hemlock rather than face exile, was deemed honourable by many ancient philosophers.<\/p>\n

Christian doctrine, though, taught that human life is sacred, because it holds a spark of the divine. Thus only God should be permitted to give or take life<\/a>. The 325AD Council of Nicaea decreed that every Christian village should have a hostelry for the sick, a principle which extended to abandoned children. For the same reason, a long-standing Christian tradition forbids suicide.<\/a> But as the Christian era has faded, so old debates about the beginning and end of life have re-surfaced \u2013 most recently, in the accelerating campaign to legalise assisted dying.<\/p>\n

Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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An excellent and very moving piece from @moveincircles<\/a> in @unherd<\/a>, with a historical view to what happens when societies sacrifice the worth of each human life on the altar of the supposed prize of "choice". @holland_tom<\/a> might find this interesting! https:\/\/t.co\/ctHMpgQrzN<\/a><\/p>\n

— Lois McLatchie (@LoisMcLatch) October 22, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n