Friday, November 7, 2014

What Brittany Maynard Wanted Us To Talk About


I know nothing about Brittany other than what the media reported and that she ultimately made the decision to die at a time certain rather than a time uncertain.  By making this decision public she apparently wanted part of her legacy to be some discussion about – presumably leading to agreement with – a person’s right to determine when to end their own life.  I won’t comment directly on that issue, but rather about how we comment about that issue.

What disturbs me about that discussion as I’ve seen it played out on Facebook is that the real freedom to opine about the matter doesn’t exist. Much has boiled down to diatribes against Christians for being judgmental, the same tired puff we heard about reactions to Robin William’s suicide.

I’m always fascinated by the biblical literacy of those who use the only Bible verse they want to quote: “Judge not”.  It is often quoted with the implication that we can’t judge somebody else because there are no moral absolutes. The moment this is said, the speaker is making both a judgment and a pronouncement of a moral absolute.

We do assess, calculate, discern, ponder, promote, reject, accept, agree, disagree, and rant and write. What part of this is judgmental in an unacceptable way? The overarching issue of the sanctity of life, the ponderings on God’s will and purpose, the calculus of hope versus despair are all quite legitimate and transcendent things to think and talk about.

A recent post (http://bit.ly/1okZegf) was very insightful and compared Brittany’s plight with the jumpers from the World Trade Center. The writer’s point was that those who chose to jump to their death rather than be swallowed in the flame and poison of the exploding plane were no different than Brittany’s choice. The writer points out that the jumpers were considered homicides rather than suicides just as Brittany’s choice was not to die but how and when to die when faced with a certain terrible death. And I think that is a great point. But the author seems to think it important to say “Christians should be the people who are the least judgmental” in the typically sanctimonious not so subtle paraphrase of  “I wish Christians would shut up”.

I suppose, with the millions of folks commenting and claiming Christian affiliation, that there were some who said that Brittany’s choice was a choice that sent her straight down the garbage chute to hell (which would be a doctrinally unsound pronouncement). But what I heard was sadness, a desire for hope, and the very real and necessary discussion about the circumstances around a person’s right, ability, and capacity to end their own life and all of the potential social consequences attached. My mother made treatment decisions about her cancer and life expectancy. My father was on life support and we agonized over that treatment, too. I’ve assessed dozens of suicidal persons. All of us are touched by these kinds of decisions – even Christians.

Why can’t we discuss whether our hypothetical decisions to jump from the World Trade Center would be different if we knew that rescue was close, or that by suffering before we die would could lead someone else to safety, or if we knew we could actually survive but be disfigured? If we want zero suffering, the answer is pretty easy. Other than that, we need to agree that it is horribly complicated.

Let Christians campaign in extremism in favor of life over death with their worldview of transcendent and eternal consequences. Let those who favor suicide and euthanasia campaign in extremism for total individual determinism with their worldview that individual choice trumps social consequences. Why must the former be labeled hateful, the latter as open-minded, and anyone in between as anything else? 

No comments:

Post a Comment