Euthanasia

I was very hesitant to touch this topic. I've noted in the past that I'm not a big fan of the culture wars. Today's approach to grave moral issues is often somewhat too laden with sensationalism, slogans, emotionalism, marches, righteous indignation, copious amounts of hot air, and advertizing boycotts. As a result, I only feel comfortable writing about the issues that make up part of the usual "moral values" repertoire if I can do so in a more comprehensive way, and one sensitive to the arguments that both sides tend to use. It isn't that I lack opinions, of course. But most of the views I have are ones I have tortuously arrived at, using all the ways we have of evaluating such things - emotion, reason, and experience.

But I do have opinions, ultimately. Hopefully you take them for what they are - not the last statement possible on the issues I raise, but my own personal expression. I hope you are not alienated by my stand.

This last weekend, a man here who had publicly announced his impending suicide a few weeks ago killed himself after having what he called a "living wake." For twenty years he had been a member of a lobby group called "Dying with Dignity" that advocates the legalization of doctor-assisted suicide for patients with terminal illnesses. He'd publicized his choice widely, and even arranged for a reporter and a photographer to be on hand. He had been criticized by many for the public spectacle he was about to create, but said about doing the deed quietly, "that wouldn't have accomplished anything."

After moving from a larger gathering at the Holiday Inn to a smaller gathering at his home (which they had trouble getting into because an opponent had damaged his lock), the family spent an hour reminiscing, until he announced it was time to carry out his plan. His son replied, "You don't have to rush, Dad."

I've seen death, three times. Even a natural death is an awful thing in that it has a kind of finality that is brutal and raw. It is the very opposite of birth, which I've also seen - birth hits you like a shock, as the tremendous power of new life is so plainly apparent. With death, the shock is the clear and obvious absence of the person you once knew - they are gone, just gone, and the body that remains there really is not the one you loved, even if it looks a lot like that person. Still, despite the fact that two of these deaths I speak of were withering, lingering deaths, there very much was a kind of dignity about these ends.

My mother in law loved camping. She was the most ardent and insistent family camper in our lot, and looked forward to that every year. So it somehow seemed fitting that, when her daughters arrived to sit at her bedside, that I go and get all of our camping chairs from the car. And in her last days, we sat around her bed in those camping chairs we had every year, telling the same jokes we told at the campfire (if somewhat sadly), and just being with her. Our love, and the love we knew she had for us, gave her departure more dignity that I can convey in this writing.

I know I am reading too much in to specific events, but the description in the newspaper suggested this death did not go well. I won't go into the gory details, but his death took longer than he expected. His family sat at his side in a kind of horrified shock as he went from a state of some remaining vigour to finally dead. And it did not end there, as paramedics came and tried to revive him, as the "Do not revive" note from his doctor was improperly offered without the doctor present - it appeared for a time they might be able to actually revive the man. In the end, his haggard family didn't know how to react - his wife said, "I don't know how we'll view this day." The account read to me not unlike those of a prison execution, even in the detail of how the relatives in the viewing booth feel.

One could argue that the problem here was not the idea, just the way it was carried out. If doctor assisted suicide were allowed, you could say, then the procedure might have been more expertly carried out, and a more peaceful departure might have taken place. But I think this is more facsimile than reality. Lethal injections in prison are meant to convey the same illusion - the prisoner is simply put to sleep. But even that is not always what it seems.

A natural and slow death is very difficult, I've seen it. I really would not wish it on anyone, and I fear it for myself. But one thing it does have is dignity. You can not only see the dignity so apparent in a person who is fighting to resist the effects of a terminal illness, but there is real dignity in the way a person lets go, and lets God.

For myself, while I would not like my life artificially prolonged, I am mindful of my faith's teaching that we are not owners of our own lives; we are stewards, custodians only. I'm not the "Captain of my soul," as per Henley's Invictus. My life is in the hands of God, and I know nothing about either the moment I came or the moment I will go.

I can't judge this fellow for how he chose to go, and the very public manner of his exit. It really is not my place. However, I do know that the living wake that was supposed to be about his life ended up being about his death, a spectacle that made the intersection of fate and choice the stage for his fifteen minutes. While it is what he wanted, I cannot help but be made somewhat sad. I am sure he amounted to more than his death, but I will never know.

My mother in law's life remained about her life. A month later, at family camp, we pulled out a camping chair, and plonked her box down on it, and put her sun hat upon it. Her box got a tent, and on the last day, we left her ashes on the island she loved so much. She is steward of her life no more, but I do not imagine she is disappointed at the new caretaker.