On September 10, we published “An Appeal,” endorsed by a long list of fellow scholars. The Appeal sharply criticized paragraph 137 of the Instrumentum laboris for the upcoming Synod on the family. In her “A Benign Reading of a Confusing Paragraph,” Janet Smith offered a thoughtful . . . . Continue Reading »
Back in 1991, I received an invitation to a party. My elderly friend Frances wanted to die. Her plan, she said, was to hold a life celebration with her closest friends: We would hold her hand, kiss her cheek, and tell her how much she meant to us—as she expressed her love for us. Then she would . . . . Continue Reading »
The threat to conscience rights in medicine is more advanced than many realize. A concerted effort is required to regain lost ground. Continue Reading »
Secularist threats against religious liberty are spreading like a stain. Thus, I was attracted immediately to Bruce Abramson's Mosaic column, How Jews Can Help Christians Live as a Creative Minority.Abramson warns Christians that the space to practice their faith in the way they live is . . . . Continue Reading »
Imagine receiving a letter telling you that while your insurance company won’t pay for experimental drugs to combat your cancer, they’d be happy to cover lethal drugs to help you die. You want to try to live a little longer, but you're only offered funding to hasten death. This happened to . . . . Continue Reading »
During World War II, German doctors euthanized disabled babies and adults. As Robert Jay Lifton reported in The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide, no one forced these doctors to kill. Many of them believed euthanasia to be a “healing treatment” that ended “unlivable” lives, liberated families from the burden of caregiving, and kept the country from “wasting” scarce resources on the lebensunwertes leben(“life unworthy of life”). Such was the fruit of years of utilitarian indoctrination and the resulting societal acceptance of eugenics ideology.At the time, Netherlander doctors were well aware that German medical ethics had devolved. Thus, when the German commander of the occupation, Arthur Seyss-Inquart (now known as “the Butcher of Holland”), commanded that Dutch medical practices adjust to the German way, Netherlander doctors courageously defied the order. Continue Reading »
Why do many see abortion as a positive good? Continue Reading »
Wesley J. Smith’s article “The Coming of Medical Martyrdom” highlights a troubling trend in Canada that would see physician’s religious rights sacrificed. But it’s not just in Saskatchewan this is happening.
Continue Reading »
If individual autonomy is the jealous god it has proven itself to be, no rights of conscience or religious freedom will be permitted to stand in its way over the long term. But when does a person actually possess this autonomy to which he is said to have a right? Continue Reading »
The case of Frank Van Den Bleeken—the Belgian murderer and rapist who requested to be euthanized rather than spend life in prison—has provoked its fair share of comment. And rightly so, the facts of this case are undoubtedly shocking. But far more shocking is the rapidly growing euthanasia culture that made this whole affair possible. This increasing normalization of euthanasia is just one of many social trends that reveals a Europe that is becoming profoundly estranged from its Judeo-Christian heritage. As that happens, European societies are losing the moral and spiritual armory with which to resist the gradual slide into a complacent nihilism Continue Reading »
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