Categories: uncategorized
Date: 13 November 2006 14:49:20
How do we know this? Well the Bishop of Southwark has said so. We should take into account the economic costs of long term healthcare and education when deciding the right for a baby to life. He said that there maybe circumstances when it is morally acceptable to perform a "possibily lethal act".
To be honest this does begin to encroach of the beliefs of many members of the wider christian congregation. Do we have the right to decide whether a child's life is ecomoically viable and is this really the sound basis for a decision?
It seems that everything is coming down to ecomonics these days. The right to life and the future of the world's climate being 2 such options. If there is a cost involved then should decisions be avoided/negated if the cost is too high? Who decides what cost is to high?
The Bishop goes onto say that "For a christian death is not the end, and is not to be avoided at all costs as if it were." Is this true? Do we have a biblical way to back this up?
If this is really true then why did Jesus raise Lazarus from the dead. Surely it was not just because he could. There must have been a sound reason for Jesus to do this. Why then?
Maybe it is because Jesus had a sense of compassion that was greater than His sense of economic necessity. Did Jesus heal the lepers, blind or sick just so that they ceased to be an economic burden on society?
Why not go one step further? Why not do away with everyone who has ceased to be economically viable? The old, the sick the terminally ill. After all this was the policy of the Nazi regime in Germany. We could extend it to allow anyone we did not approve of. That would help to solve economic and climate issues.
Euthanasia under the Nazi's was stopped by the churches speaking out and publicising what was happening. That's why the extermination camps started in Poland, to keep the policy quiet and beyond proof. Yes, there was knowledge throughout Germany of what happened but, as it was carried out a few hundred miles away, it was easy to ignore.
So I'm sorry Bishop but you have this wrong. It is NEVER morally acceptable to end a life on economic grounds. Babies aborted at 22 weeks have survived and not had the predicted medical problems. I know someone who has survived with Cerebral Palsey and MS and still makes a huge contribution to the lives of people who know him.