by Craig Lofthus, Founder and Director of The Father’s Ranch, "a a place of hope and healing for woman caught in various addictions."
June 2013
“So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male
and female He created them.” Genesis 1:28
My wife Sharon and I have been caring for her blind brother Paul for 4 months
now. He’s 58 years old and is struggling with brain seizures and dementia. He
has recently been in and out of the hospital quite a few times, but his most
recent stay was quite an eye-opener for us. The hospital medical staff and
social workers went to great lengths to “educate” Sharon and me on the only
humane and decent action for Paul or for anyone in Paul’s circumstances. Their
counsel was…“let him die peacefully and painlessly by restricting his food and
using terminal sedation agents.” Even where assisted suicide is illegal, many
hospitals now endorse this “terminal sedation” which is the ethically murky
practice of anesthetizing patients and then cutting off their nutrition and
liquids. As a matter of fact, their counsel had been more like aggressive
harassment than advice. Once they perceived we did not agree with their plans,
their euthanasia campaigning was shifted into high gear, and we were bombarded
with their “right to die” hostile rhetoric! They said that the care Paul is
requiring is so substantial, laborious, and expensive that we can’t justify not
letting him die. After all, Paul didn’t represent a viable, valuable return for
the future. I’m thinking…“so now human life has a price tag?” In addition,
they said that Paul could no longer have any kind of “quality of life”. This
one made me wonder…“who is it that defines this ‘quality of life’ ideology and
verbiage so often used by euthanasia advocates, and what metrics are being used
to determine “quality of life”?
In the course of Paul’s hospitalization and treatment, we had time to really
consider what the “living will” and the concept of euthanasia (Greek word for
good death) means today. When I contemplate the concept of “dying well,” I
can’t avoid the uneasy feeling that it actually means dying when the
intellectual elite think it is appropriate for you to die! The liberal,
euthanasia ideology that is being taught throughout our academic and medical
institutions is making its way into every corner of America’s hospitals and
nursing homes. As Paul’s medical POA, Sharon and I have refused to sign a “good
death” roadmap that would give medical staff permission to euthanize our brother
Paul.
Given advances in medical treatments and technologies, end of life issues can be
truly vexing and excruciatingly difficult — even for those who attempt to think
ahead. I realize that living wills are a central fact of life and death in
medical centers, nursing homes, hospices, and hospitals. Groups such as the
American Bar Association and the American Medical Association push living wills
and advanced directives as a way of limiting care at the (perceived) end of
life. The whole point of a living will is to allow medical personnel not to
resuscitate or to deny “artificial” food, water, and breathing assistance. This
way the patient dies through acts of omission, not commission. Somehow this
makes the participation in their death more palatable and ethical? I
wholeheartedly disagree.
The classic Hippocratic Oath and its prohibition against physicians giving
people a “deadly drug” has collapsed with the growing acceptance of such notions
as physician-assisted suicide, the “right to die,” and even giving some very
sick, disabled, or demented people a little push over the edge. People facing
end-of-life decisions may well feel strong pressure from the medical and
bioethical establishments to make the choice that will save the most money as
well as spare their relatives, medical staff, and society at large the burden of
their continued existence.
This movement toward a “good death” has spread to places once
thought safe from the temptation of euthanasia. The American Academy of Hospice
and Palliative Medicine reversed its long-standing opposition to
physician-assisted suicide (which is legal in Oregon but is obviously being
quietly practiced by many doctors elsewhere) and adopted a new set of rules that
effectively endorsed the practice. The academy even decided on a new euphemism
for the procedure: “physician-assisted death.” Changing “physician-assisted
suicide” to “physician-assisted death” is a clever manipulation of the language,
but it cannot disguise the fact that the key word to the concept is death —
assisted by a physician. Have you noticed how groups advocating death so often
use manipulative and misleading language? Let’s put the players on the field
folks. Today’s euthanasia culture is a rank violation of the 6th commandment,
commanding us that we…“shall not murder.” Euthanasia is a slippery slope.
The idea of a self-defined “good death” has its place in the pagan cultures of
history but not in the Biblical culture of Christianity. Christians should
understand and embrace the reality of death, but we must also affirm the gift
and value of life. The Bible makes it clear that we are not the masters of our
own destinies, nor are we the sovereigns of our own souls. As Christians, our
lives belong to the Lord and are in God’s hands at all times (1st Cor 6:19, 20).
This society’s pilgrimage down a wide road to euthanasia should concern all
citizens but Christians in particular. When life is believed to come from the
cosmic, evolutionary muck and mire that eventually developed into mankind as we
know him today, then the lack of care and concern for life that we are seeing is
totally consistent.
What the intellectual elite fail to take into account is that humans have been
made by God and in the image of God. This gives human life eternal value and
significance and should change the paradigm on euthanasia completely. For the
Christian, death should be longingly anticipated as the royal gate by which we
joyfully enter into the Celestial City, yet we must remember that it is the
right of the King to summon His subjects when, where, and how He deems it
appropriate and right. We understand that many of the reasons Biblical thinking
Christians are coming into conflict with secular, humanistic thinkers in the
realm of euthanasia is because of what we believe about the origins of life. Is
the topic of euthanasia connected to creationism and evolution? Yes,
undoubtedly so. In the end, my hope is not to have a “good death” according to
the euthanasia advocates but rather to die in faith and in peace according to
the Scriptures.
(used with permission from The Father's Ranch June newsletter. To sign up for the newsletter, visit The Father's Ranch website.)
Thank you for sharing your experience with me.
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