Advocates of euthanasia or physician assisted suicide point to the Netherlands as an enlightened society, a utopia for ending one's life. The Netherlands has moved from assisted suicide to euthanasia, from euthanasia for people who are terminally ill to euthanasia for those who are chronically ill, from euthanasia for physical illness to euthanasia for psychological distress, and from voluntary euthanasia to involuntary euthanasia. The guidelines which were initially put in place to protect society have been modified over and over. Rules governing the procedure are violated with impunity. With the passage of an Oregon law, now being challenged in the courts, our own country has embarked on a course from which, once started, may be unstoppable.
Death ought to be hard to sell.
Men and women and young people who learn of a terminal illness are filled with terror and uncertainty and dread. Killing them, or assisting them to kill themselves, is not the answer. God's Son declared that he came to bring life, abundant life, even in dying. If it is death with dignity that we seek, if it is control over our departure that we seek, then we need to leave the time, and the method of the final exit to the Great Physician. Only He knows enough and loves us enough to make that decision.