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and then tell me rationally if suffering like this for a few days/week or so before dying gives any sort of honor and glory to God, as Christians claim it does.
Personally, I've changed my views drastically in the last several months or so on euthanasia/hastening death. I no longer feel bound to this Catholic/Christian dogma that ending one's life a little earlier when one is in such a state is breaking any moral laws of God. I mean were I in such a state as portrayed in the video it's pretty evident I'm going to die anyway, right? What's so bad if I ask for a few injections to ease my suffering and the injections cause me to slip over to the other side?
I frankly just don't see how God is pleased by a person suffering this way and I don't buy the argument that "God gave life; only He has the right to take it away". I can see how it would be morally wrong if a person is distraught/depressed, but otherwise perfectly healthy. But when a person is suffering horribly and the life is slowly ebbing out of a person's body, then I think it becomes a morally just thing for someone to painlessly stop their suffering.
Anybody feel the same as I do, or do you have objections to the notion of nudging your own death along in such cases?
Last edited by thrillobyte; 04-27-2014 at 07:58 PM..
Which god? I mean, have you read the Old Testament Bible?
Yahweh positively ADORES suffering and violence.
Well, you're right about that. But then Yahweh is just another pagan god like Horus and Mithra, albeit the god of the Jews, supposedly God's chosen people. But then Christians think they are God's chosen people so the cycle of ignorance and stupidity continues, doesn't it?
But if we throw away the notion that Yahweh is the real God and that the real God is not revealed to mankind; He sits up in the 7th heaven farthest away from earth, then does this fact change my original thesis?
There is nothing in the Bible that says or suggests that suicide is a sin.
I have no qualms whatsoever about euthanasia. I think it is cruel to keep someone around just so they can suffer. Granted, they'd have to volunteer for it - it should never be forced onto someone. Unfortunately, though, with our "wonderful" for-profit health care system, long term end-of-life care can literally clean out an entire family. We shouldn't have to think about money when a loved one is dying, but there you go, just another "joy" of our American system. The fact that only two or three states allow for euthanasia is just one more religious ideal creeping into our laws.
At any rate, for some, their lives are over even if they haven't died. They will never recover, they will never get better, and their existence is nothing but a drug-induced haze or extreme, torturous pain. If they want to end their own misery, who are we to stand in their way?
And what if the dying person's loved ones were there? Would it be god's will for them to witness it as long as possible?
If you stick to the strict letter of the Bible the answer is an affirmative "YES!"
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shirina
Suicide was made a sin by the Church in 364 A.D.
There is nothing in the Bible that says or suggests that suicide is a sin.
I have no qualms whatsoever about euthanasia. I think it is cruel to keep someone around just so they can suffer. Granted, they'd have to volunteer for it - it should never be forced onto someone. Unfortunately, though, with our "wonderful" for-profit health care system, long term end-of-life care can literally clean out an entire family. We shouldn't have to think about money when a loved one is dying, but there you go, just another "joy" of our American system. The fact that only two or three states allow for euthanasia is just one more religious ideal creeping into our laws.
At any rate, for some, their lives are over even if they haven't died. They will never recover, they will never get better, and their existence is nothing but a drug-induced haze or extreme, torturous pain. If they want to end their own misery, who are we to stand in their way?
I'm with you, Shirina. If I ever get a terminal diagnosis I will immediately move to Oregon, establish residency and put myself into palliative sedation when the pain and discomfort get to be too much to handle. Technically, that's not suicide, even though it does tend to hasten death. But I suppose at that point I won't much care anyway.
Here's one I'll bet Catholics didn't know:
The Roman Catholic Church made suicide a mortal sin in the Medieval period so that they could catch and interrogate people they suspected of heresy? Pretty clever, when you think of it. "We want to interrogate you and torture and then burn you, so don't kill yourself or you'll end up burning in hell for all eternity, not that you won't, anyway, as we intend to excommunicate you before burning you."
Last edited by thrillobyte; 04-27-2014 at 08:08 PM..
If you stick to the strict letter of the Bible the answer is an affirmative "YES!"
I'm with you, Shirina. If I ever get a terminal diagnosis I will immediately move to Oregon, establish residency and put myself into palliative sedation when the pain and discomfort get to be too much to handle. Technically, that's not suicide, even though it does tend to hasten death. But I suppose at that point I won't much care anyway.
I think it's very important to have customs or laws in place to make it difficult to commit suicide on impulse.
A severe chronic condition with no chance for recovery is entirely different, imo.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Having someone's life prolonged by being hooked to a machine is the part that is playing God. I don't know if I believe in euthanasia but I adhere to letting nature take it's course.
I've said it once and I'll say it again. Having someone's life prolonged by being hooked to a machine is the part that is playing God. I don't know if I believe in euthanasia but I adhere to letting nature take it's course.
I'll let nature takes its course as long as I've got enough morphine pumped into me that I don't even know or care what nature has planned for me.
These people in countries like the one in the video are suffering this way for one or both of two reasons:
1. their religion forbids them to ease their suffering. In other words, suffering is earning stripes with their gods.
2. the countries are too poor to be able to afford the pain killers and the drug companies are too cheap to provide them on humanitarian grounds. If you check the stats you'll see that pain killers are most available in the US, Canada and Europe, thank God . Less so everywhere else, including Australia, big surprise.
Let's face it: religion and suffering are synonymous in peoples' minds. No matter how peppy and user-friendly modern American mega-churches dress Christianity up to be, it, like every other religion, is ultimately founded on self-loathing and masochism.
Something about religion makes people WANT to suffer.
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. Less so everywhere else, including Australia, big surprise.
