Why do Christians oppose abortion? It is because we are taught by scripture to value life. This includes the unborn to the aged to those with disabilities. When we start to find it acceptable to eliminate those on the fringes of health because they are a burden or because they are in pain and about to die.
The spirit of the enemy, the spirit of anti-christ has been at work in the world for a very long time. The last time that spirit controlled much of Europe was in the early part of the 20th century.
During the rise of the National Socialists party (aka the Nazis) we saw the children and adults on the fringes of society taken to the newly created facilities created to end their suffering using gas. These facilities later were upgraded to handle a large number of people so that an entire undesirable race could be eliminated.
Now, that same spirit is rising up once again as it sets it’s sites on not only Europe, but the world. Euthanasia (aka murder) is already legal in countries like Belgium. Once again it is the socialists that are working to expand who can be eliminated. Working from the outside fringes toward the inside, man is eliminating the imperfect and the unacceptable. What category do you fall into?
Christians have a divine obligation to stand up to tyranny and evil. We must stand up for life, the life of man. Because man is made in the image of God and every life has worth.
This from the Washington Post
In Belgium, where euthanasia is now legal for people over the age of 18, the government is considering extending it to children — something that no other country has done. The same bill would offer the right to die to adults with early dementia.
Advocates argue that euthanasia for children, with the consent of their parents, is necessary to give families an option in a desperately painful situation. But opponents have questioned whether children can reasonably decide to end their own lives.Belgium is already a euthanasia pioneer; it legalized the practice for adults in 2002. In the last decade, the number of reported cases per year has risen from 235 deaths in 2003 to 1,432 in 2012, the last year for which statistics are available. Doctors typically give patients a powerful sedative before injecting another drug to stop their heart.
Only a few countries have legalized euthanasia or anything approaching it. In the Netherlands, euthanasia is legal under specific circumstances and for children over the age of 12 with parental consent (there is an understanding that infants, too, can be euthanized, and that doctors will not be prosecuted if they act appropriately). Elsewhere in Europe, euthanasia is only legal in Luxembourg. Assisted suicide, where doctors help a patient to die but do not actively kill them, is allowed in Switzerland.
In the U.S., the state of Oregon also grants assisted suicide requests for residents aged 18 or over with a terminal illness.
In Belgium, the ruling Socialist party has proposed the bill expanding the right of euthanasia. The Christian Democratic Flemish party vowed to oppose the legislation and to challenge it in the European Court of Human Rights if it passes. A final decision must be approved by Parliament and could take months.
In the meantime, the Senate has heard testimony on both sides of the issue.
“It is strange that minors are considered legally incompetent in key areas, such as getting married, but might (be able) to decide to die,” Catholic Archbishop Andre-Joseph Leonard testified.
Leonard said alternatives like palliative sedation make euthanasia unnecessary — and relieves doctors of the burden of having to kill patients. In palliative sedation, patients are sedated and life-sustaining support is withdrawn so they starve to death; the process can take days.
But the debate has extended to medical ethicists and professionals far from Belgium. Charles Foster, who teaches medical law and ethics at Oxford University, believes children couldn’t possibly have the capacity to make an informed decision about euthanasia since even adults struggle with the concept.“It often happens that when people get into the circumstances they had so feared earlier, they manage to cling on all the more,” he said. “Children, like everyone else, may not be able to anticipate how much they will value their lives if they were not killed.”
There are others, though, who argue that because Belgium has already approved euthanasia for adults, it is unjust to deny it to children.
