Missionaries of the Sacred

Advocates of euthanasia and assisted suicide often cite unbearable pain as a reason for their position. While some people seek the “right” to end their lives because of extreme physical suffering, research shows that severe pain is not the only reason people ask their doctors for a lethal injection or to help them commit suicide. In a national survey of US physicians in 1998, 18% of doctors reported that a patient had asked them for a prescription for a lethal dose of a medication, and 11% reported that a patient had requested a lethal injection. What reasons did these patients give for wanting to end their lives? While patients gave more than one reason, only 29% of physicians perceived severe pain as one of these reasons. Over half of the physicians reported that patients were concerned about loss of dignity, 47% cited loss of meaning in their lives, 34% were concerned about being a burden and 30% with dependency. These findings remind us how much is at stake if a society allows euthanasia and assisted suicide. Every human life has dignity and no one should be made or encouraged to feel that their lives have no meaning or that  the ones they love would be somewhow better off if they didn’t have to care for them.

In the United States, we tend to value independence very highly. While there is nothing wrong with valuing independence, we must not equate independence with worth. Our dignity does not come from us or from anything we do. Rather, our dignity comes from our Creator, from the fact that each and every one of us is made in the      image of God. Although the extent to which we rely on others varies, the fact is that no one is completely independent; we all need God and each other. Remember, even Jesus accepted Simon’s help with carrying the cross.

A just society is one which respects the dignity of all its members, especially the most vulnerable ones, which include people who directly or indirectly are made to feel that their worth is tied to something they do. In addition to speaking out against the practices of euthanasia and assisted suicide, we must challenge some of our underlying attitudes towards  human worth and what it means to be “independent” or “dependent”. We must ask ourselves what really gives meaning to our lives.