One pro-family group REAL Women of Canada has had its requests for funding consistently denied by the federal government. Another, the Alberta Federation of Women United for Families, actually got so far as to have a cheque for $8,000 in the mail, only to have Secretary of State David Crombie stop payment. Why? These groups are contaminated in bureaucratic eyes by standing proudly for pro-life principles, that why. The Secretary of State’s press aide attempts to deflect criticism ... (Continue reading)
In my half-century of life this is the second time I’m living through the acceptance and practice of euthanasia. As a child growing up in Poland during the Nazi occupation (alternately with the Russian occupation) I remember that most our difficult job was keeping Grandpa from being shot by the Nazis. By Nazi standards Grandpas life was already devoid of value: he was close to 70, had a stopping posture, and on his left temple he had skin cancer which ... (Continue reading)
A discussion paper given in Winnipeg at the Annual Directors’ Meeting of Campaign Life Canada – October 1986. Dr. Everett Koop warned us of the Slippery Slope and he predicted that abortion, by taking away the value of the life of an unborn child, would lead to the diminishing value of all human life. Three and a half centuries ago the clergyman-poet John Donne said the same thing: “No man is an island…any man’s death diminishes me because I ... (Continue reading)
It seems that the “quality of life” ethic now encompasses more groups of people than the “unwanted” unborn, handicapped and elderly. In Britain, the Oxfordshire District Health Authority decided that a 44-year-old would no longer receive life-saving kidney dialysis treatment because “he would have died within weeks or months from his hypertension.” Both the British Kidney Patients Association and Labour MP Lewis Carter-Jones, have called for an independent enquiry into the issue of allowing some kidney patients to ... (Continue reading)
Marguerite Liegeois, aged 73, a founding member of the Association for the Right to Die with Dignity, committed suicide in late February. According to a Reuter’s report from Paris, she sent a letter to the group’s members explaining that her health was failing and that the “only way to a dignified and upright death is to voluntarily interrupt life.” The manner of the suicide was not disclosed. (Continue reading)
Helen Charlotte Hough, 60, divorced mother of four children and author of children’s and mystery books, was jailed for nine months after helping a friend to commit suicide. Mrs. Hough admitted to the attempted murder of Anneta Harding, age 83, described as frail, deaf, nearly blind, arthritic and lonely. She put a plastic bag over Miss Harding’s head after a supposedly-lethal mixture of drugs and drink failed to work. The prosecution had originally charged Mrs. Hough with murder but had ... (Continue reading)
Euthanasia is “the deliberate intervention to bring about the death of another human being,” usually because the life of that person has been judged to be of little value. Euthanasia, which is illegal in Canada, can be divided into two major types, voluntary and involuntary. Involuntary euthanasia is effected towards those who do not participate in the decision making process. Involuntary euthanasia has been further considered in terms such as direct or indirect, active or passive, etc. ... (Continue reading)
FRANCE: Dr. Christian Barnaard, pioneer of life-saving heart transplant surgery, said on September 21 that he supported euthanasia. He stated that it was a physician's responsibility to give terminally ill patients "a good death." He spoke at an international conference organized by the Association for the Right to Die in Dignity. Bernard denied that this was a contradiction with his life's work, according to a UPI report in the Ottawa Citizen (Sept. 22, 1984). His patients "wanted to ... (Continue reading)
"Spina Bifida is a birth defect which involves damage to the spine and nervous system. The vertebrae of the spine and the spinal cord are not formed properly and surgery is usually required immediately after birth. The long-term effect frequently includes weakness or paralysis of the legs and problems with bowels and bladder control. Spina Bifida is sometimes accompanied by hydrocephalus (accumulation of fluid within the brain), which is controlled by a surgical procedure relieving the ... (Continue reading)
Infanticide is not a horror coming upon us in 1984. It has been here for some time-in the United States, in England, in Canada and around the world. According to the Globe and Mail last June, a doctor, who admits he deliberately ordered an overdose for an infant girl in Edmonton's University Hospital, said Euthanasia is happening everywhere but nobody is talking about it." He was referring to the widespread custom of allowing handicapped babies to starve ... (Continue reading)
For those who would like to see death offered as an option in health care the discussion is now centered on who will be the executioners. Some believe "the burden of responsibility for administering euthanasia would still rest solely on the doctor" (Richard Trubo, An Act of Mercy). Others believe that board made up of diverse kinds of people should have the responsibility. The World Medical Association spoke of euthanasia as contrary to medical ethics, the public interest and natural ... (Continue reading)
Doctors who practice good medical ethics understand their role in dispensing health care. Death and social engineering are not their areas of competence or responsibility. The individual who is sick is their responsibility, not society at large. They recognize the possibility of wrong diagnosis, non-infallible prognosis (where the doomed patient survived). And the possibility of a new cure, all of which prompt them to be cautious in their practice. According to Edwin L. Lisson in his Linacre Quarterly article, ... (Continue reading)
But the new "cool" violence-presented as killing in the name of compassion, and referred to as "concern for the dying" seems to have had a different effect on the public, particularly when it is practiced under "impeccable auspices." For example: Doctors at the Yale-New haven Hospital in the United States and Doctors at the Sick Children's Hospital in Toronto have allowed retarded infants to die by withholding food and medical assistance. This was premeditated killing of the innocent ... (Continue reading)
The Centre for Life Understanding The following is Part 6 of a 6 part article. Originally published in The Canadian Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Toronto, in 1980, reprinted here with permission. A statement from the Science Council of Canada in the Toronto Star, August 18 1979, notes that "mercy killing could well become the social issue of the next century - somewhat like the subject of abortion today." With the events which have transpired during the ... (Continue reading)
The Centre for Life Understanding The following is Part 3 of a 6-part article. Originally published in The Canadian Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Toronto in 1980, reprinted here with permission. part 3…….. “If the physician presumes to take into consideration in his work whether a life has value or not, the consequences are boundless and the physician becomes the most dangerous man in the state.” Dr. Christopher Hufeland (1762-1836) The Marriage and Family Newsletter (1977) on euthanasia was written ... (Continue reading)