Suffering and the Sanctity of Life

Photo Credit: pastorappreciationblog.com

Suffering is a consideration that seems to supersede all others in the contemporary world, especially if it conflicts with traditional understandings of human nature and the morality that assumes that nature. In particular, the idea of the sanctity of human life, that it has been pronounced holy by God and may not be taken except as criminal punishment or in war (depending on how divine commands are interpreted), is now being set aside in favor of a doctrine of quality of life that values persons to the degree they are well developed, healthy, and strong. Confronting this issue from a Christian perspective was the topic of a presentation by Joni Earekson Tada at Alex MacFarland’s Truth for a New Generation apologetics conference in Spartanburg, S.C., on September 5.

She began by noting that in the contemporary world, human status is regarded as based on an individual’s capacities. As an example, she quoted from a newspaper article by a doctor dealing with Alzheimer’s patients, who, describing persons in the advanced stages of the disease, declared that “in the truest sense of the word, the Alzheimer’s patient has lost all of the qualities that make him or her human.” She commented in response that “our humanity is now based on a sliding scale of what we think quality of life should be … society no longer believes we are created, or made in the image of God, rather … cost, convenience, comfort, these are all factors that are having an impact on peoples ‘definition of humanity’ … the weak, the infirmed, the medically fragile, and the vulnerable, they are falling through the cracks.” As a result of the increasing prevalence of this “quality of life” idea of human nature, news stories concerning murders committed for convenience of relatives, advocacy of euthanasia, and quadriplegics desiring euthanasia are something we have come to expect. If “you take God out of the picture,” we are not even “glorified animals,” Joni declared. She commented that when she became a quadriplegic in 1967, she wanted, and tried, to commit suicide, “but back then, society wasn’t so fast to agree with me.” But today, doctors now are more inclined to tend to the “culture of death.” This is aided by the current “quality of life” policies of the current administration. Obamacare will penalize doctors who treat certain “severely sick” people, such people may “not get the treatment” they would have received ten years ago. We should not be surprised that “the vulnerable, the infirm, the frail, the elderly, have never fared well in societies that have lost their moral center.” While the West is losing its moral bearings, this failure to respect the humanity of people who are severely impaired is notably prominent in the developing world. “97 percent of disabled children in developing nations suffer violence and abuse,” Joni said. They are imprisoned in sheds, cupboards, and garages, as well as being “starved to death.”

Another example of a society measuring humanity by a person’s strength and valuing the strong rather than the weak was Nazi Germany. There it was the weakest of the disabled who were killed first, and among them, the first to go were those in institutions with no family, friends, or visitors. “The lessons that we learned from that era have not been transferred to this post-Christian generation that we live in now.” Even some Christians believe in physician assisted suicide, she pointed out. Against this, we need “a new narrative that promotes life as that holy, sacred, gift.” Quoting the Bible, she said, “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all those who are destitute” (Prov. 31:8). When the Bible speaks of rights, God is speaking of “moral claims that can be made on society.” But these moral claims, “true rights, have their basis in God’s moral law, but cut loose from God’s moral law, rights become nothing more than people’s willful determinations, all dressed up in politically correct language, to give them a showy kind of dignity, or respectability.” While it may seem that the current rights-oriented debates in America are appealing to high principle, in fact “the exercise of rights then become nothing more than a national competition between who’s more victimized than who.”

Joni claimed that in coming out of the depression that followed her incapacitation, an important factor was the believers who came to help her. There in her room in her institutional setting, these Christian friends also helped everyone else there, and most, she said “were agnostics.” Like those who helped her and her roommates, Christians should “practice Christianity with its sleeves rolled up … Just as the cross of Jesus Christ is no longer a symbol of despair but a symbol of hope,” so her wheelchair is no longer a “symbol of confinement, but a symbol of the Good News.” Thus apparent disability, rather than being a reason for the death, can become an avenue to the fullness of life. After the ministry of these Christians, Joni said that “47 years later, I am still feeling the repercussions of their prayers and their love.” Passing this on through the organization she established, Joni and Friends, is “the highest privilege I can imagine. That’s how you change culture.” What can change culture is “the small decisions that you make, the probing conversations that you have, the actions that you take.” Because so many bad choices are being made in society, “we need to get out there with our choices, our decisions, our conversations.” We must “point people to the God of the Bible, who alone can reveal the meaning and the purpose behind their pain.” True human dignity, Joni said, flows from the realization that “we are bought with a terrible price … we are image bearers of the God who has made us.” Sharing the Good News must aim at changing people’s hearts. While the secularization and hedonism of contemporary society may move Christians to despair, we should “not lose heart.” We should “not just declare, but demonstrate the Good News … Go where the Kingdom is at its weakest, and make it strong.” In a letter to another quadriplegic who wanted to die, she said of Jesus that “I would rather be in my wheelchair knowing Him, than on my feet without Him.” Her conclusion about how to confront the world’s suffering consistent with the sanctity of life taught in the Bible is that Christians should “go out, and make Jesus real.”