Assisted Suicide and the Ailments of Culture

Assisted suicide, or what is called “medical assistance in dying (MAID)” in Canada, is no new topic in our cultural. During my childhood, the name “Jack Kevorkian” became a byword and a punchline due to his advocacy for medical professionals helping their patients die instead of helping them live.

To those immersed in the flood of modernity with its emphasis on the radical autonomy of the individual, it is only logical that someone should be permitted or even encouraged to end their life in a clinical, sanitary manner. Why create a mess or a scene of horror for a loved one to find when you can end your existence with a slow wave of drowsiness wafting over you from the silent dripping of a potent fluid in a shapeless plastic bag?

Such an end is no more than what US Supreme Court Justice Kennedy argued for in the infamous Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision in 1992:

“At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.”

That philosophy was, until the recent Supreme Court decision, sufficient to permit the killing of a child in the womb. It is a reflection of an entire cultural ethos that echoes that famous hymn of hell: “I Did it My Way.”

A recent ad from Canadian retailer La Maison Simons, or Simons, presents assisted suicide as a heroic, beautiful, and self-fulfilling way to die. Were the subject not so macabre, it would be a lovely video to watch.

(Note that the ad, originally published on October 24, 2022, has been pulled by the retailer due to negative reaction.)

For the Christian, of course, life is sacred. Whether in the womb or in the last moments of natural life, there is goodness and beauty in life. David taught us this is Psalm 139:16 while speaking to God:

“Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.”

 So, for the believer in Christ, of course intentionally ending one’s life is sin. For those of us who recognize that God’s laws are universal, there is no question, then, that assisted suicide is a sign of a corrupt society.  

But how dare we argue against the non-Christian’s right to day at the hour of his choosing? Is this not an example of “forcing our religion” on others? Or, what if this is really a big problem that will create social injustices and it is simply because of our knowledge of the goodness of God that we are able to see its horror and where it will inevitably lead? 

It is not too hard to see right now that the assisted suicide train is running away on the tracks. In Canada, since 2016, there have been over 31,664 reported deaths through MAIDs with 10,000 of them in 2021. This amounts to approximately 3% of all deaths. 

The current debate in Canada is whether mental illnesses, like depression, should be considered a justifiable reason to request the state to terminate the requestor.  

In the discussion offered in the report to the Canadian Parliament, the authors seem to recognize how dangerous making this option available to  those suffering from mentally ill. However, they also seem to shrug, noting that the original language of the statute allows assisted suicide for “that illness, disease or disability or that state of decline causes them enduring physical or psychological suffering that is intolerable to them and that cannot be relieved under conditions that they consider acceptable.”  

This is “the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” It is the right to die. If you don’t like the conditions under which your pain can be alleviated, then you have the right for the state to kill you. 

It does not take much to see how this right to die can quickly become the easy way out. How it can become a convenient way to avoid the hassles of a system built to make more expensive treatments hard to get. It can be an option so that “inconvenient” people who rely on care and accommodation from others can be “conveniently” encouraged to ease the burdens of others. It takes little imagination how the “beauty,” as the Simons ad calls it, could be a way to end a period of sorrow or struggle that might have made the person or their neighbor a little better as a person. That convenience may remove a whole lot of beauty from the world. 

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
-          John Donne