Social media has been abuzz about the video of 29-year old Brittany Maynard who has terminal brain cancer and has announced that she intends to commit suicide Nov. 1. Mrs. Maynard and her husband moved from California to Oregon where physician-assisted suicide is legal.
I viewed her video and, as one would expect, it is heart-wrenching. Facing a terminal illness would be scary for anyone, perhaps especially for someone so young, and a newlywed to boot.
As hard as it is to see someone facing their mortality at such a young age, it is even more heart-wrenching to see her surrender to a culture of death that proclaims our lives as a possession over which we have total control. This view that we own our lives is a fundamental principle of organizations seeking to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia.
Derek Humphrey, founder of the Hemlock Society, now euphemistically called “Compassion and Choices” wrote the following at the beginning of his suicide how-to manual: “If you consider God the master of your fate, then read no further.” The Final Exit Network (www.finalexitnetwork.org) has proclaimed this simple message: “My Life, My Death, My Choice.”
These pro-euthanasia groups are exploiting Brittany Maynard’s story to increase public acceptance of assisted suicide and euthanasia and, eventually, to legalize it throughout the country. Currently, physician-assisted suicide is legal in Oregon, Washington and Vermont.
In addition, Courts in Montana and New Mexico have ruled against those states’ laws against assisted suicide. A handful of other states have recently considered legalizing assisted suicide (through legislation or ballot measures) and, for now, have rejected such measures. But, as is evident in the Maynard case, pro-assisted suicide groups will keep pushing for public and legal acceptance of their agenda.
Our Catholic faith teaches that every human life has sacred dignity as a precious gift of a loving God. In response to God’s precious and sacred gift of human life we are called to be responsible stewards of our own lives and for the lives in our care.
In the Vatican Declaration on Euthanasia, the Church reminds us that “Human life is the basis of all goods, and is the necessary source and condition of every human activity and of all society. Most people regard life as something sacred and hold that no one may dispose of it at will, but believers see in life something greater, namely, a gift of God’s love, which they are called upon to preserve and make fruitful.”
Being responsible stewards of God’s gift of life, the Declaration continues, “gives rise to the following consequences:
“1. No one can make an attempt on the life of an innocent person without opposing God’s love for that person, without violating a fundamental right, and therefore without committing a crime of the utmost gravity.[4]F-20
“2. Everyone has the duty to lead his or her life in accordance with God’s plan. That life is entrusted to the individual as a good that must bear fruit already here on earth, but that finds its full perfection only in eternal life.
“3. Intentionally causing one’s own death, or suicide, is therefore equally as wrong as murder; such an action on the part of a person is to be considered as a rejection of God’s sovereignty and loving plan. Furthermore, suicide is also often a refusal of love for self, the denial of a natural instinct to live, a flight from the duties of justice and charity owed to one’s neighbor, to various communities or to the whole of society - although, as is generally recognized, at times there are psychological factors present that can diminish responsibility or even completely remove it…”
Let us pray for Brittany Maynard that she (and others like her) will experience the love of Christ, change her mind, and choose to join her suffering to the One who suffered and died to redeem us.
