Euthanasia
“It is I who bring forth death and life” (Deut. 32:39).
The ever-increasing technological advance of Western society since the
Industrial Revolution has given rise to a determined effort to secure man’s
control over all aspects of his existence. Having wiped God from his mind,
modern man places himself upon the pedestal as the supreme lord of life
and death. Only his own creative genius limits his dominion.
Man has usurped control over the creation of new life through
contraception and abortion; in order to usurp control over death the social
revolutionaries now clamor for the legalization of euthanasia.
Contraception, abortion and euthanasia are fruits of the same anti-life
mentality.
Euthanasia is any act or omission which of itself and by intention causes
death with the purpose of eliminating all suffering.¹ It is the moral
equivalent of suicide and hence a sin against the fifth commandment. Its
proponents often masquerade it under euphemistic terms such as “mercy-
killing,” “self-delivery” or “dying with dignity.” Many qualifiers are often
attached to the word, such as active or passive, negative or positive,
voluntary or involuntary.
These slogans are devised simply to beguile public opinion into accepting
euthanasia. Euthanasia is slowly being introduced worldwide by means of
carefully planned stages:
(i)
To defend always the omission of extraordinary means of
preserving life once a patient has irreversibly entered the dying
1
Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration on Euthanasia,
1980.
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