Assisted-Suicide in the Medical Field
Christian Segers, Staff Writer
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California has become the fifth state to legally endorse physician-assisted suicide after the recent court verdict of Oct. 11 passed.
Spiritually speaking, it is not biblically coherent nor is it morally sound for physicians to engage in such practices.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17 states, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.”
Clearly, it is not only God’s desire, but God’s righteous demand that people do not take their lives into their own hands. Unfortunately, the Bible here is not clear as to the consequence of such actions, but there is implication of punishment from the Most High. Since the individual in question is deceased, however, it is only logical to assume that the punishment would have to hold eternal consequences.
As individual vessels of the Lord, it is our duty and our mandate to finish well the race we have started. As far as the physician-assisted suicide laws are concerned, a key fact not included in the aforementioned article, is that physicians do have to issue a prognosis of six months or less to live, according to CNN.
It is important to note that medical practitioners are still bound to a legal code that prohibits suicide for arbitrary reasoning. In California, the client seeking this form of medicinal specialty must give a total of three requests before compliance by the medical staff. It is interesting to note how this process differs from the other four states that have legalized the same act.
Unlike the new legislation in California regarding suicide-assistance, in Montana, Oregon, Vermont and Washington, it is not required to request lethal pills both orally and in written form. However, no amount of requests, regardless of the form in which they are given, should warrant the suicide of a human being.
By taking their lives into their own hands, people are bypassing the remainder of the lives that they have been given. Although physicians are talented individuals, sometimes miracles can occur without their foresight or prior knowledge. Should not God remain the judge on when He “appoints man to die?”
