Dying from compassion

The “Mother of Parliaments” — that’s the one in London — has been embroiled for months in a debate over “assisted dying,” which is euphemized elsewhere under other Orwellian monikers: “Medical Assistance in Dying,” “Physician Assisted Suicide,” “Physician Assisted Dying,” and so forth. The bill legalizing this odious practice narrowly passed the House of Commons on June 20 and has been subsequently debated in the House of Lords. Further parliamentary procedures may delay a final decision until next April or May; the parliamentary clock may even run out on the bill, which would be all to the good.

Perhaps the most bizarre intervention in the Lords’ debate came from the former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, who informed his noble colleagues that “The Christian faith has very little to say directly about [euthanasia]” and warned his fellow-bishops in the Lords not to “risk our legitimacy by claiming that we know better than the public and the Other Place [the House of Commons].”

Which brought to mind five hilarious minutes in that marvelous BBC satire, “Yes, Prime Minister,” when the generally hapless prime minister, Jim Hacker, puzzled by a Church-proposed candidate for bishop whose agnosticism and left-wing politics he finds bizarre, is instructed on the state of the Church of England by the Cabinet Secretary, the smoothly cynical Sir Humphrey Appleby: “The Church of England is primarily a social organization, not a religious one … part of the rich social fabric of this country. So bishops need to be the sort of chaps who speak properly and know which knife and fork to use.”

To which Sir Humphrey might have added, “…but need not exhibit any familiarity with the Fifth Commandment.”

Happily, there were far more trenchant and morally informed voices raised in and around the Lords’ debate.

Writing in the Spectator, columnist Douglas Murray noted, correctly, that “there is no country in which euthanasia has been introduced in which the slope from the arena of palliative care has not slipped into the killing of the mentally ill, the young, and those who feel they have become a burden on their families or the state.”

In the House of Lords on September 19, Lord Moore of Etchingham spoke movingly about the Beachy Head Chaplaincy Team, which offers counseling to those about to jump from the beautiful cliff at Beachy Head in Sussex — “the number one suicide spot in the world,” to which “online suicide forums” provide directions and instructions on how people can “jump to their death,” something attempted at least once a day. The Chaplaincy team engages these disturbed souls on their nine-minute walk from the nearby parking lot to the edge of the cliff. And Lord Moore notes, “Offered the right mix of professionalism [in counseling] and human kindness, people change their minds. Of those 271 with whom the chaplaincy intervened this year, only 57 even reached the cliff, and only four actually jumped.”

Lord Alton of Liverpool, a veteran pro-life leader, reminded his colleagues in a written statement that “euthanasia of the weak was practiced in the ancient world but was rejected as we became more civilized and recognized the equal and inherent worth of each person, regardless of ability or disability, age or capacity.” Wasn’t the “assisted dying” bill a regression from that civilizational advance? Would it not be more civilized and humane to offer the terminally ill the hope of a peaceful death through a deeper investment in palliative care?

Lord Moore and Lord Alton, both of whom I am proud to call friends, understand the truth of what Douglas Murray also wrote: that the “argument and rationale” for “assisted dying” has been boiled down to “…‘compassion.’ … Everything is about ‘understanding,’ ‘listening,’ ‘speaking for,’ and ‘alleviating’ the sufferings of others … all other judgments and rationales being put to one side.”

This descent into emotivism and sentimentality has profound consequences for society as well as for individuals. As Lord Moore concluded in his remarks to the Lords, “The Bill does not support the freedom to kill yourself: that we already have. It confers a right to kill yourself with the active assistance of the state and doctors, and at public expense … Under this legislation, the [medical] professionals will, by definition, be people wishing to fulfill a person’s wish to die. No one will be present to advocate the choice of life.”

Compassion is entirely admirable. Misconstrued and then distorted by being detached from reason and biblical morality, it becomes an agent of what Pope St. John Paul II aptly called the “culture of death,” which threatens the moral foundations of Western civilization.

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