Last week I summarized the U.S. Bishops’ new statement against assisted suicide. The statement is a reflection of the Church’s consistent teaching that assisted suicide and euthanasia are grave violations of the law of God. As Pope John Paul II said in Evangelium vitae, "In its deepest reality, suicide represents a rejection of God’s absolute sovereignty over life and death…"
The Catholic Church’s teaching against assisted suicide and euthanasia is fairly well known. What is perhaps less well known is the opposite extreme: that Church teaching does not require Catholics to utilize every medical intervention or treatment to prolong our lives as long as possible.
Catholic teaching on the meaning of life, suffering and death guides us to avoid both extremes: actions intended to cause death on the one hand, and insisting on useless or disproportionately burdensome treatment to avoid death at all costs on the other hand.
This teaching is embodied in a document by the Nebraska Catholic Conference (NCC) entitled "Medical-Treatment Decisionmaking: Moral Guidance and Considerations from Catholic Teaching." The document’s introduction presents the basic foundation for our moral obligation to be responsible stewards of our lives:
"The Catholic Church affirms the sanctity and dignity of every human life as a precious gift of a loving God. All men and women must respect the lives of others while accepting the duties of responsible stewardship for their own lives and for the lives in their care.
"At the same time, however, faith in the resurrection and hope for eternal life have enabled the Catholic tradition to accept death as the inevitable end to temporal life and to believe that death is the gateway to eternal life. It is for this reason that there is no obligation to utilize all possible medical interventions, all possible means of prolonging life. Death need not be avoided at all costs.
"Although Catholic teaching does not look upon biological life as an absolute value, nevertheless it rejects suicide, assisted suicide and mercy killing because they are intrinsically opposed to the reverence for life that Christians are called upon to manifest and express. Compassion and care for dying and seriously ill or disabled persons must never include the willingness to assist in the direct ending of their lives."
Clearly, most decisions that individuals or families must make about whether to utilize or forego medical treatment fall somewhere between the aforementioned extremes. Therefore, the NCC document provides the following moral principle to assist us in determining whether a medical intervention is morally required or morally optional:
"If a particular medical intervention is necessary or useful for the preservation of life or restoration of health, it is ethically ordinary and there is a moral obligation to use it. If, however, a particular medical intervention is analyzed and judged by the patient to be useless (offering no reasonable hope of benefit) or excessively burdensome, it is ethically extraordinary and therefore morally optional."
The document provides other very useful principles to assist us in making moral medical-treatment decisions. It is available online at www.nebcathcon.org or by contacting my office. My office also has sample healthcare power of attorney forms that incorporate Church teaching and comport with Nebraska law.
You can contact Greg at The Nebraska Catholic Conference, 215 Centennial Mall South Suite 310, Lincoln, NE 68508; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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