We discussed euthanasia in
2009. I had a blog
article talking about various forms of voluntary dying. I
also referred to the
proposal of an euthanasia court for saving lives in addition
to determining the genuine euthanasia cases. This is a complex
and controversial subject which we often heard people said let us
not discuss it. But the reality is that euthanasia is being
practiced in many countries. Britain in particular is under
immense pressure to have this resolved. In 2010, the Commission
on Assisted Dying was set up for conducting an in-depth inquiry on
this subject.
The Commission was chaired by Lord Falconer, a barrister and
former justice secretary, and included members with expertise in
law, medicine, social care, mental health, palliative care,
theology, disability and policing. The Commission engaged in a
wide-ranging inquiry into the subject, including a public call for
evidence which received over 1,200 responses, public evidence
hearings, international research visits, and original and
commissioned research on the issues surrounding assisted dying.
The report of the Commission was published this month. You may
wish to see the
BBC news article on this. It concludes that the current
legal status of assisted suicide is inadequate and incoherent.
The current legal regime can be distressing for the people
affected and their families, health and social care staff, and
also on police and prosecutors. A proposed legal framework for
assisted dying is laid out in detail in the report, including
strict criteria to define who might be eligible to receive
assistance and robust safeguards to prevent abuse of any new law.
The Commission also considers that substantial improvements to
health and social care services would be needed in parallel with
changes to the law. It proposes that the role of any future
assisted dying legislation must be to provide all people with
access to high quality end of life care and protect potentially
vulnerable people from any form of social pressure to end their
lives, at the same time as providing people with greater choice
and control regarding how and when they die. If you are
interested in the details, please
read the full report.
It would be interesting to know what was the views of the religion
sector towards this issue. Among the 11 commissioners, only
Reverend Canon Dr James Woodward disagreed with the conclusion.
The report duly carries an appendix on his statement on the
inquiry. In particular, he said "This complex and contested area
of human life cannot be dealt with through the law or medicine
alone. We need to engage further with the social and ethical
reflections on experiences of death and dying." Despite almost
two years' inquiry and 1,200 responses, hearings and researches,
he was still undecided and wanted never-ending reflections. A
better reflection of his intention continued: "There are important
theological questions about suffering, personhood and the value of
the vulnerable that need to inform a more open conversation about
death and dying in Britain today."
Suffering is actually the central point in the whole issue.
Euthanasia is for the relief of unnecessary suffering, but there
is another meaning of suffering in the theological sense.
Suffering may be good in the sense of sacrifice and repent. Thus
there is no need to end the suffering prematurely. But there is
another religious notion that dying is the passage into eternal
life. For a good person, he will pass into heaven. The
encouragement of endurance to unnecessary suffering and the delay
to the passage seems to contradict this notion. Perhaps everybody
has to first go to the purgatory before going to heaven.
Suffering before dying may somehow offset the purgatory fire a
little bit.
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