PART 1
By
Kelleigh Nelson
February 6, 2013
NewsWithViews.com
Euthanasia is a long, smooth-sounding word, and it conceals its danger as long, smooth words do, but the danger is there, nevertheless. –Pearl S. Buck
Condemned
German: "But we didn't think it would go that far."
American judge: "It went that far the very first time you condemned
an innocent human being." –Conversation in the American
motion picture "Judgment at Nuremburg."
"From the Soviet gulag to the Nazi concentration camps and the killing fields of Cambodia, history teaches that granting the state legal authority to kill innocent individuals has dreadful consequences." –Pete Du Pont, former Delaware governor
Passive Euthanasia
My dear mother died on July 19, 1994. She had Alzheimer's, but her death was hurried along because she was deprived of food and water. My baby sister had medical power of attorney and was convinced by the nursing home physicians that mother would feel no pain. When I found out, I called the nursing home in Illinois and spoke to the medical director. I told him I did not want my mother starved and dehydrated to death. He told me she wouldn't feel anything. He never said she was receiving any pain medication. I responded that there wasn't much difference between what he was doing to my mother and what was done by the Nazis to concentration camp prisoners. He answered that my mother could feel nothing because she didn't have her brain function any longer. Of course, being starved and dehydrated doesn't help with brain function of prisoners either. I hung up and wept bitter tears. Momma died three days later. I later found out that what was done to my mother had been common practice for several decades. My mother did not deserve this end. Hydration would have kept her body comfortable until God took her home.
This is called "Passive Euthanasia." Euthanasia is Greek for "good death," but there is nothing good about dying from a lack of hydration. [Link] Passive Euthanasia is all too common in America today. It is hastening the death of a person by altering some form of support and letting nature take its course. Examples include such things as turning off respirators, halting medications, discontinuing food and water thus allowing a person to dehydrate or starve to death, or failure to resuscitate.
Passive euthanasia also includes giving a patient large doses of morphine to control pain, in spite of the likelihood that the painkiller will suppress respiration and cause death earlier than it otherwise would have happened. Such doses of painkillers have a dual effect of relieving pain and hastening death. Administering such medication is regarded as ethical in most political jurisdictions and by most medical societies, including the special "cocktail" given by Hospice employees.
These procedures are performed on terminally ill, suffering persons so that natural death will occur sooner. They are also commonly performed on persons in a persistent vegetative state; for example, individuals with massive brain damage or in a coma from which they likely will not regain consciousness.
The slippery slope of murdering the vegetative or terminally ill started in l935 in Britain, in l938 in the US, and in l980 in Canada. The British and American groups were very small and insignificant for the next two decades. It became bigger and more vocal after the hugely-publicized Karen Ann Quinlan "right-to-die" case in New Jersey in l976, which revealed to the public the extent of modern medical technology to extend life indefinitely in a persistent vegetative state.
Opinion polls show average support of 60 percent in the USA, 74 percent in Canada, and 80 percent in Britain. When actually voting in official ballot measures, the support has been 46 percent in Washington State (l991), 46 percent in California (l992), and 51 percent in Oregon (l994), which now has legalized assisted suicide. As for physicians, numerous opinion polls indicate that half the medical profession would like to see it made law. It also appears that about 15 percent of physicians already practice it on what they believe are justifiable occasions. Some leaderships of the professional medical associations remain adamantly opposed, but they seem to be declining rapidly.
Those who object to euthanasia are the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, as well as fundamentalist protestant denominations. Killing an innocent is a crime against the 6th commandment, “Thou shalt not murder." This commandment forbids the killing of the innocent, not the killing of the guilty, which can be sometimes ordered by the state for the common good. This is clear in the Old testament where Moses also gave laws to kill the guilty, and in the doctrine of the above mentioned churches. Euthanasia is a crime against the same commandment, just as is abortion. They are both murder.
Three people have told me about deaths in their family and what has happened with hospital employees and Hospice care. My mother's experience was in an Alzheimer's nursing home. Their stories are going to become more common with Obama Care. Here is the American physician's original Hippocratic Oath. (Russian and Islamic physicians take different oaths.)
The Original Oath of Hippocrates
"I SWEAR by Apollo the physician and Asclepius, (the Greek god of medicine and healing) and Hygieia, (daughter of the god of medicine, Asclepius, and the goddess/personification of health) and Panaceia, (another daughter and goddess of Universal remedy) and all the gods and goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will fulfill according to my ability and judgment, this Oath and this covenant. To hold him who has taught me this Art as equal to me as my parents, and to live my life in partnership, and if he is in need of money, to give him a share of mine, and to regard his offspring as equal to my brother in male lineage and to teach them this art, if they desire to learn it, without fee and covenant, to give a share of the precepts and oral instruction and all the other learning to my sons and to the sons of him who has instructed me and to pupils who have signed the covenant and have taken an oath according to the medical law, but to no one else. I will apply dietetic measures for the benefit of the sick, according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice. I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly, I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy. In purity and holiness, I will guard my life and my Art. I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.
Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all internal injustice, of all mischief, and in particular of sexual relations with both female and male persons, be they free or slaves. What I may see or hear, in the course of treatment or even outside the treatment in regard to the life of men, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep to myself holding such things shameful to be spoken about. If I fulfill this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and the practice of the art, being honored with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite be my lot."
Obviously, one does not have to swear allegiance to a Greek polytheistic deity, but swearing the oath to a personal God is a tie that binds. The rest of the oath is pretty clear. Of special import is the portion I highlighted. Sadly today, our medical personnel have decided to speed death along rather than giving aid and comfort to the sick and suffering. They've become the "god" who decides life and death. I fear this practice on the sick and elderly will accelerate in the coming years, no, actually I know it will accelerate. For 40 years we have murdered the most innocent, America's unborn babies. When I wrote the article, THE CULTURE OF DEATH, I said I would write another article regarding after-birth abortion proponents and their plans. I couldn't bring myself to face the research I'd collected to write that article. The truth of our death culture is often more than I can bear especially with the babies. The elderly in our country have been the targets for decades as well. Instead of being cherished and honored, they are being treated as "useless eaters" that should quickly die. We need to know what to expect, what to alert our loved ones to watch for, and what to tell them we want at the end of our lives.
In 1993, Dr. Reed Bell wrote the book, Prescription Death: Compassionate Killers in the Medical Profession. He discussed the changes that had taken place in European countries over the previous 25 years. These changes are now happening in America at an exponential speed. Our culture has changed from a basic Judeo-Christian ethos and ethic to the prevailing secular humanist ethic and ethos. We have moved from a sanctity-of-life ethic to a "quality-of-life" ethic. Since 1973, we have accepted the right of women to kill their unborn babies for any reason at all because it's a woman's "right to choose," and now, with Obama Care, we are moving rapidly to condoning suicide and the "right-to-die."
One of the most frightening aspects of the euthanasia movement is called crypthanasia, (active euthanasia on sick people without their knowledge). A typical case might be an older person who has suffered a heart attack and is in the emergency room. His problem could be ameliorated with a pace maker, but because of his age and the cost of care, he is denied treatment and is allowed to die, or even assisted in dying (murdered)--by a physician who has decided he is not worth saving. This is done without the patient's or his family's knowledge or consent. The Judeo-Christian ethic has moved to a quality-of-life ethic and eventually moves to a "compassionate killing" of patients and the "duty-to-die." Once we've accepted the notion there is a "right-to-die," it doesn't take much rationalizing to accept the idea that there may also be a "duty-to-die" and that our medical profession has an obligation to help people along in the dying process--even against their will.
The
Manufacturer's Handbook is clear throughout both the Old and New Testaments.
Clearly, life is a gift, and only God Himself has the right to choose
when our lives on earth come to an end. Human beings are not animals but
unique beings made "in the image of God" (Gen 1:26-28). God
says, "Thou shalt not kill" (Exodus 20:13), and "CHOOSE
LIFE" (Deuteronomy 30:19).
Life is a gift from God and the moment of death is God's prerogative.
"Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are
with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass; "
(Job 14:5).
"To every thing there is a season, and a time for every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted" (Eccl 3:1-2).
Sickness or injury at the end of life can cause suffering that can be trying on the family as well. Yet, again, God says, "Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer ... Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life" (Rev 2:10).
God can heal even the hopeless cases. "...heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils; freely ye have received, freely give" (Matt 10:8). "For with God, nothing shall be impossible" (Luke 1:37).
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The majority of us fighting the onslaught of Communism in our beloved country are baby boomers. We are the ones the Communists in our governments want to eliminate next, most likely through Obama Care, which is a huge tentacle of UN Agenda 21's population reduction plans. I've had several phone calls from friends whose family members have died in hospital or with hospice. The effort by medical care givers to speed the last breath of the dying is obvious in many cases.
One wonders, "Where is the church?" This is a question I'm often asked by those of you who read my articles. We'll look at the church in an article to follow this one. Pray for our nation, pray for her people, repent for our sins, plead for mercy, and fight the monster of Communism. "And having done all, to STAND!" For part two click below.
© 2013 Kelleigh Nelson - All Rights Reserved
Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,
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Kelleigh Nelson has been researching the Christian right and their connections to the left, the new age, and cults since 1975. Formerly an executive producer for three different national radio talk show hosts, she was adept at finding and scheduling a variety of wonderful guests for her radio hosts. She and her husband live in Knoxville, TN, and she has owned her own wholesale commercial bakery since 1990. Prior to moving to Tennessee, Kelleigh was marketing communications and advertising manager for a fortune 100 company in Ohio. Born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, she was a Goldwater girl with high school classmate, Hillary Rodham, in Park Ridge, Illinois. Kelleigh is well acquainted with Chicago politics and was working in downtown Chicago during the 1968 Democratic convention riots. Kelleigh is presently the secretary for Rocky Top Freedom Campaign, a strong freedom advocate group.
Website: www.rockytopfreedom.com
E-Mail: Proverbs133@bellsouth.net
