Euthanasia is defined as the act or practice of ending the life of an individual suffering from a terminal illness or an incurable condition, as by lethal injection or the suspension of extraordinary medical treatment." However, this definition holds more emotions and opinions than many issues today, both on a moral and religious basis. Where do you stand on this controversial debate?
In early 1990, a 27-year old female experienced cardiac arrest and was left unattended for 70 minutes before she was discovered and taken to a local hospital. During these 70 minutes, her brain was without oxygen, and the result was massive and irreversible brain damage that affected her cognition, perception, and awareness capabilities. She was diagnosed to be in a persistent vegetative state 3 weeks after emerging from a coma that lasted for two and a half months. Doctors declared that there was very little chance of recovery.
She remained in this vegetative state for fifteen years, as her husband legally battled with her parents for six of those years to have the gastric feeding tube, which was keeping this woman alive, removed. Finally, her feeding tube was permanently detached (an act of passive euthanasia) on March 18, 2005, and she died thirteen days later on March 31 at the age of 41.
This is the story of Terry Schiavo, a well-known case demonstrating the moral conflict of euthanasia, debatable especially in cases such as this one, where the individual is mentally unqualified to make a decision concerning his or her own life. On one side, there are those that believe euthanasia would be an unnatural and unethical way for someone to die; this raises not only moral arguments, but religious ones as well. On the other hand, a patient is completely incapacitated and has lost the ability to enjoy life because of their condition, and euthanasia would appear to be a reasonable end to the individual's suffering. It is because of these latter individuals that all forms of euthanasia should be legal.
From the standings of the Catholic faith, euthanasia is the early ending of an individual's life, a life which God had not intended to take. “In Catholicism, human life is viewed as a gift from God,” says Jessica Steinmetz, who wrote an article concerning euthanasia for the section Your Guide to Christianity on About.com. “Taking away human life is turning one's back on God and not being grateful for His gifts. When human beings take life decisions into their own hands, [they] are in great risk of committing very evil sins.” She ends her article with the statement that dying unnaturally is not a real solution. However, those who are opposed to euthanasia because it is to “turn against God” fail to recognize that without the help of modern-day medication and life-supporting devices, the individual considered for euthanasia would not be alive at all. He or she is living in an unnatural way that would also go against religious beliefs in the way that modern medicine is "acting as God."
Another website, which examines the ethical aspects of euthanasia, points out that many faith groups believe that there is positive value in suffering, for both the terminally ill and his or her caregivers and family. However, almost anyone who reads this statement could find it inaccurate and even absurd. At the level of suffering that some patients reach, like Terry Schiavo, where the individual's brain cannot function properly and prohibits the living of a meaningful life, no positive value can be determined for the patient, much less for his or her caregivers and family. Not many could look at the agonizing stand-still state of their loved ones in a positive or enriching perspective.
Regardless of religious views, one must keep in mind that not everyone in the U.S. follows the same faith; this is where the government stepped in and put in place a separation of Church and State law. Religion should not govern over individuals or their families when either has to make the choice between life or death, and the law should not enforce anything stating otherwise. “For every deeply religious person who is affected by this law,” says a religious tolerance website (www.religioustolerance.org), “there are others who are not religious or secular that must abide by them.”
Comparatively, all faiths that felt euthanasia was “morally unacceptable” only felt this way about active euthanasia, a type that requires physical action in taking a life, by overdosage of medication, injection of poison, or other similar means. Passive euthanasia is defined as: intentionally causing death by not taking action to prevent it. Passive euthanasia is not considered illegal because, while no action was made to prevent the individual's death, no action was taken to actively kill, as is required in active euthanasia. A doctor cannot be prosecuted for failing to save a life. Therefore, passive euthanasia, when allowed, is the most common method in the United States today.
However, there is also disagreement on the morality difference between passive and active euthanasia. While active euthanasia involves the physical action of taking a life, it is immediate and eliminates the majority of suffering that comes with passive euthanasia. Passive euthanasia is normally conducted through the withdrawal of food or water; if these actions were taken against someone who was healthy, it would be considered a very abusive and torturous form of murder. While patients under the consideration of euthanizing are mentally unaware, or in a comatose/vegetative state, their bodies are still affected by the debilitating processes involved in starvation and/or dehydration.
