The Culture of Death II
This is where we are--in the culture of death based also in the culture of the lie. Yet, it is not just abortion. It is also euthanasia-the big lie about "the good death." The so-called Dutch cure that has now found a home in America is not an issue in the ambiguous, uncertain future. It, too, is focused in the very concrete present. It is nothing less than a reversal of the logic of life. Now, we will not only end life just after its conception, we will end life as it comes to its end. We will, in fact, determine it. The creature will seek to be the lord of its own destiny, and so we will seek not only to manipulate its beginning, but also to terminate at the end. We have decided, so it seems, that if we as finite humans cannot be freed from the threat of death itself, we will, at least, be the lords of our own death. We will choose death on our own terms. We will choose death for ourselves-and you just wait-we will be choosing death for others as well.
The so-called "Dutch-cure" has been revealed in terms of the slippery slope from passive to active euthanasia. Regardless of the lies that are told, there is no such thing as a "good cure death." Euthanasia inevitably slides from passive to active when it is the technologies of active euthanasia that are celebrated as new opportunities. They are new opportunities, in fact, to control life and to control death. Active euthanasia is not only a threat to the elderly, the infirmed, the disabled, and the chronically sick, but it will soon be spoken of in terms as a duty to die. And this is already the discourse common in some American circles. Economic and emotional arguments are used to appeal to the duty to die of those who reach the end stage, an awkward stage, or a chronically disabled stage. According to the logic, the infirmed thus remove themselves from being a financial burden and a source of emotional stress to their families and society at large.
Not surprisingly, we see, here, the breakdown of the moral conscience once again. These issues cannot even be discussed in the public square with any sense of truth and authority, of right and or wrong. Everything is reduced not only to matters of technology, but also to the images of victimhood. I was shocked when I read a letter to the editor about the aforementioned
Victims of limited choices? I suppose Adam and Eve fit that category as well. We are all "victims" of limited choices. It is only in the utopian panacea of modern progressive liberalism and moral relativism that one would even conceive of a life unlimited in terms of choice. The culture of death continues with the development of genetic engineering. The cloning of a sheep a few years back has set lose a virtual bonanza of cloning opportunities that are being played out before our very eyes. The ethical dimensions of cloning are raised in only the most superficial and dismissive sense. We will be lord not only of the womb and not only of our own death, but we will be lord of our own genetic code, guided only by our own sense of destiny and our own sense of good.
The creature will play the creator, thus distorting the dominion mandate of Genesis into a stewardship which is not ours. When we were told to exercise dominion over all creation, that mandate did not extend to tampering with the genetic code and the cloning of humans. This leads to such issues as the ownership of cloned organisms. We now have genetic patents on certain forms of life. Why not patent certain forms of human life in such a way that you could clone a certain species much the way General Motors releases a new line of cars? We see the specter of host bodies produced in order to make available donor organs.
This is truly the ultimate narcissism. We love ourselves so much that we will give society and human history another one of us. And then another, and yet another. But, not only is it the ultimate narcissism, it is also a biological destruction and a time bomb of unprecedented proportions. Just imagine what will happen when God’s intention with regard to our genetic diversity is reduced by cloning. It is a threat to the survival of the human race. It is, perhaps, the attempted euthanasia, not just of the individual, but of the species.
We have also witnessed the human genome project, which holds much potential for good as it maps the entire genetic code of the human being. But it also holds great peril. It represents an awesome moral challenge. What will we do with what we learn? What will we do with the knowledge of the genetic code not only of the species but of particular individuals? What will be the options politically and culturally sustained in the culture of death?
Baroness Warnock, who lead many of the bio-medical discussions in
Originally published May 09, 2004.
