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10 – 15 years ago I would have agreed with you, but now I have a more ambiguous attitude or approach. In this particular case, depression may have been temporary and in fact the family may have rushed to judgment yet that’s a tough call for anyone to make. However, those who face death from a life threatening disease or a condition that frequently leads to death frequently reach the point where “fighting the good fight” is no longer important and they “wish to go gently into that good night”. At that point I suggest the law remove itself in favor of the family and the actual individual.

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I have some experience with a suffering child. It is tough. My son is autistic and goes through quite abit of frustration because of it. A year and a half ago he had a 6 hour seizure. He was close to death. Never for a moment did I think, ‘well, at least he’ll no longer have a ’second-class existence”. I prayed for him to live, and he did, for which I’m so grateful.

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I met a man this month who is a quad. He was at his bro’s wedding (my husband was the pianist, and I was the “road crew” setting up equipment), cutting up, asking my husband to hold the mic up for him so he could “preach”, and cheerfully teasing his mom.

I asked him what had happened–motorcycle accident.
He told me he and his quad friends take their wheelchairs in to be juiced up and then race.

This guy could only move his head very slightly to control a lever up near his chin. His breathing was somewhat labored. I enjoyed him so much!

The fact that he couldn’t move without help didn’t diminish his value. I wish I had asked him if he went through a dark time when he was first injured.

The young man in the thread was depressed, and his family took that as a permanent condition, and helped him kill himself. Their empathy was misplaced. Instead of agreeing with him that his life was now worthless, and arranging for his death, they should have helped him explore options, and encourage him.

Maybe the whole family was depressed. Maybe they didn’t have the emotional energy to encourage him. But maybe our worldwide slide into a culture of death influenced them to call it quits on their own child.

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Empathy is a powerful human trait in which you try to see an issue from someone’s perspective. Its a difficult trait to acquire and maintain and even more so if you believe there are fundamental truths, but one which is necessary to truly come to grips with an issue which involves powerful human emotions and values. In reading comments that mention “wallowing in self-pity” and “treating him like a burden” “making him feel unwanted” etc. I don’t see empathy rather I see judgment (stone throwing to be precise).

Every day in hospitals throughout North America, parents of sick children or children of the elderly are faced with similar ethical dilemmas and each resolve their dilemma in a manner which allows them to sleep at night. Until you are presented with a DNR checklist on one hand and a loved one suffer in pain which will not end (only suppressed by narcotics), I suggest you treat does who have check the boxes and sign the orders with a little more respect. I realize the parents in this story were not faced with a DNR but the wishes of a fully cogent adult child are hard to ignore.

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What would it matter to you what the Bible says, you don’t believe it anyway?

Life is precious. I met Joni Joni Eareckson Tada, is a beautiful woman of God. She has been a great influence on millions of people.

Joni’s website below

http://www.joniandfriends.org/

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NJLawyer has just had it with the callousness of the Pro-Abortionist posters here on WMB. For Pro-Lifers this whole murder thing is unacceptable. Did you not know all of this before?

You won’t change our minds. At least we know that we won’t change any minds but still have faith that the Holy Spirit can. We often pray for you. Please forgive us for our lapses of Christian love.

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What a joke!!! Everyone knows the GOP is the party of greed!

For NJL, it’s all about inappropriate overuse of the pejorative term “lefty.” As if repeating it ad nauseum can hide the fact that she has quit using reason or evidence altogether to make what cannot even properly be called a point.

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“One of the marks of being a Christian is the acceptance of absolute standards of right and wrong.”

Actually, this is the mark of being a fundamentalist in one of many religions that do not all accept the same “absolute” standards but, nevertheless, maintain their chosen traditions in the face of ethical reasons to the contrary. Christianity is truly a scary cult like all the others!

“God sets the standards, not people. Determining right and wrong is not a matter for consensus or tolerance.”

Priests of long ago made up standards and their followers push their interpretation as if “God did it and that settles it.” This enables them to avoid criticism and the responsibility incumbent on each individual to think about what is right. It works well if your audience is the credulous MOMOF5!

That’s why conservative Christians, who accept Scripture as THE authority, persist in being one-issue voters, for instance, when one of God’s standards is at stake.

Well no – there are many issues in the Bible and some that aren’t in the Bible but Christians pretend they are. GOP Christians prioritize issues arbitrarily, even if their connection to the Bible is tenuous or non-existent (as in the case of same-sex marriage). This thread is another case in point – where does it say in the Bible anything like “Thou shalt live no matter what, unless I the Lord God kill you through some means beyond your control, even if I’ve nearly killed you and made your life completely unbearable!” ????

Nowhere!

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