A Catholic Look at Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide

I have more than a little interest in the assisted suicide proposal being put on the ballot, in Massachusetts.  It wasn’t so long ago, that I was thought to be dying.  Ugh—that purgatorial illness!  People still talk about being afraid that I was dying.  I literally was wasting away. 

I knew I was a burden.  My husband was my right hand.  And my left!  He cooked, fed, dressed, and cleaned me up when I was too weak.  I was wasting away in my own diarrhea.  It’s called Cronkhite Canada Syndrome and it’s an adult onset disease.  Old, weak people die from it, because they’re too weak to fight it off. 

We discussed putting me in a nursing home.  I couldn’t expect hubby to be at my beck and call forever.  It would have been for the best.  He was relieved from responsibilities by other members of my family.  I was a burden to everyone I loved.  My death would have been a relief—to everyone.  We discussed my funeral.

That’s what I thought.  I was praying to die.  Death couldn’t come quickly enough.  I wasn’t suicidal because the fifth commandment is something I know well.  (My apostolate is prison ministry.)  But because I was weak, and mentally depressed, I could have been easily exploited by  misguided health workers.  I also wondered  if I had lacked health insurance (Thank you Governor Romney.) would I have felt pressured to die, to ease my family’s financial burden of mounting medical bills. The cheapest way out was to die.   I was way too vulnerable to the opinions of others, in my condition. 

I wasn’t in excruciating pain, but I was suffering.  Because I am Christian, I know the value of redemptive suffering.  I put myself into God’s hands and if He permitted me to live, it was because He had more work for me to do.  If that work was to suffer then so be it, I’ll be a good Christian example of suffering.  His ways are not my ways.  I wasn’t in the mood to meditate on it, I just prayed acceptance.

It was simple.  I would die in God’s time, not mine.  He knows best.  And it’s a good thing I didn’t do anything rash, because it wasn’t my time.  God had other plans.  I’m still working on them, but the lessons I learned from that experience were life changing. 

That death wish was depression.  I wonder if that’s the case with those who have committed euthanasia, or asked for assisted suicide.  Most physical pain can be managed.  The book of Exodus tells us that we are stewards of life.  We are not God; we are answerable to God, for how we have cared for life.  How would one explain that we played God and decided who would die, and who wouldn’t?

I know that the ballot question on euthanasia and assisted suicide will couch the question in words of compassion.  But I’m telling you the words are just a misleading, erroneous seduction.  The question is  really, “Who decides whether you live or die.?”  It shouldn’t be the decision of the vulnerable sick person, who probably needs depression medication.  And it shouldn’t be the decision of those who look upon the ill as a burden.  And it can’t be left to politicians to decide by popular opinion.  Genocide has been committed upon those whom society has decided were burdensome: the poor, the frail, elderly, marginalized, minorities because they have no voice, people who lack health insurance, etc.  Good Lord!  This ballot question is a slippery slope.

Pain usually isn’t the reason, because nowadays, pain can be managed.  I know it wasn’t with me.  I am thankful that I’m Catholic and could depend on the sacraments for consolation.  Fortunately, I had a Spiritual Director, at the time, and the comforting grace of Anointing of the Sick.  Catholicism is the best religion to be in sick in, and following, to die in.  God is the author of life, don’t let anyone convince you otherwise.