Assisted Dying
The differences between euthanasia, assisted suicide and assisted dying may be unclear to many, since they are very closely related and together represent a concerted attempt to overturn the sixth commandment of the moral law, “Thou shalt not kill”, as a fundamental principle in our society. “Euthanasia” is regarded as the intentional ending of a life to relieve suffering, such as a doctor administering a lethal injection. “Assisted suicide” is aiding or encouraging someone to take their own life. “Assisted dying” is the term given to facilitating the death of someone who is diagnosed as being terminally ill.
Three Bills have been debated in Parliament in recent years which have sought to legalise “assisted dying” and, thankfully, these have all been defeated. A number of fairly high-profile cases have been brought in the courts but they have all been related to “assisted dying”, involving terminally-ill people. Again, all of these cases have been unsuccessful. A new legal challenge is being mounted in the Supreme Court by Paul Lamb, who is paralysed from the neck down as a result of a car crash many years ago. He is not terminally ill but, since he suffers from chronic pain, he argues that he should be allowed to end his life when he wishes, aided by his family, who would be liable to prosecution under current legislation on suicide.
There will be a terrible danger to the lives of vulnerable people if the current law is changed, and many voices in the medical profession have sounded a salutary note of caution. It is worrying that the Royal College of Physicians have changed their official policy on the issue from opposing a change in the law to adopting a “neutral” stance. This flew in the face of the 80% of specialists in palliative care who voted against any change in the law, in a vote among members of the College.
Of course, there can be no neutrality in moral and spiritual issues and it is not surprising that Mr Lamb is being supported in his attempt to change the law by Humanists UK, who campaign for the secularisation of our national life under the guise of “human rights”. If “assisted suicide” ever becomes
1The reviewer would draw particular attention to Thomas M’Crie’s Life of John Knox, republished by Free Presbyterian Publications, £6.50.
law in this country, we greatly fear that, like the legalising of abortion, the proposed safeguards would prove illusory over time. The great enemy of life is Satan, who was a murderer from the beginning, and if the Sixth Commandment is further eroded in our society, he would not be slow to use every opportunity afforded by such evil legislation to drag multitudes of precious souls to hell unawares. It is incumbent upon us to pray that this attempt to change the law would also fail.
AWM
University Union Bans Pro-life Group
The Students Union of a University – which in past generations was noted for producing godly, talented men amongst its alumni – has decided to ban a society which “dared” to oppose the prevailing abortion culture. Aberdeen University Students Union holds a strong pro-abortion stance and campaigned to legalise abortion in Northern Ireland, as well as supporting abortion and the availability of the morning-after pill on the NHS in Britain. It has now refused the Aberdeen Life Ethics Society (ALES) membership, stating that there is an “unreasonable display of pro-life material within campus and at Union events”. Without belonging to the Union, ALES will not be eligible for grants, nor will it be able to use university facilities or engage with the new student intake at fresher’s week.
The society has tried several times to gain membership of the Union, applying to Aberdeen University’s Societies Union Committee (AUSA). Apparently in November 2017 AUSA had implemented a “pro-choice” policy indicating that the Union would give “no funding, facilitation, or platform to any pro-life group and forbids the unreasonable display of pro-life material on campus”. On receiving its latest application, it informed ALES, “We unfortunately are unable to affiliate Aberdeen Life Ethics Society as you are directly against an AUSA policy and so we are not allowed to affiliate you”.
ALES’s founder Alex Mason, a doctoral student in the University’s divinity faculty, says, “I think this is a culture zealous for abortion rights”. He adds that the “main purpose of the society was to hold debates on campus on sex-selective abortion and screening for such conditions as Down’s syndrome”. He acknowledges it might demonstrate near abortion clinics, but insisted it “would not hold up pictures of dead babies or yell and scream at women”.
Mr Mason explains that “the issue began during student elections, when some candidates were strongly expressing their commitment to abortion rights”. At the election hustings he tried to ask “why the right to choose an abortion trumps the right of a baby to live” and was told: “We don’t need to answer the question because of AUSA’s pro-choice policy”. This flies in the face of Aberdeen University’s policy statement on ethics and diversity, which
states, “The University is also committed to providing a learning, working and social environment in which the rights and dignity of all its members are respected, and which is free from discrimination, prejudice, intimidation and all forms of harassment”. Alex Mason concludes, “Universities should foster free debate and discussion over important ethical issues like abortion. Unfortunately, there is a lot of social pressure on young people to conform to the pro-abortion viewpoint. For many of us, our pro-life beliefs were forged from our understanding of gestational science, as well as our Christian faith. The ability to express these beliefs must be protected.”
Sadly Aberdeen is not the only university affected. Reports reveal that, at many UK universities, policies are being implemented which limit religious expression and actively curtail free speech. On the abortion issue, in Scotland, there have been specific cases of pro-life societies being censured at Glasgow and Strathclyde Universities.
ALES is currently being helped take action against Aberdeen University by the Christian Legal Centre, on the grounds of discrimination. Its Chief Executive, Andrea Williams, states, “Through this policy a small number of students at Aberdeen University are representing the interests and diverse beliefs of nearly 14 500 students and have recast the Students Association as a pro-abortion campaigning organisation”. She concludes, “The case at this University alone is appalling, but it is part of a disturbing and snowballing trend across the UK, where student unions are pushing, not just the abortion debate, but a number of issues, in one direction. How are students supposed to hear the case for the human right of the pre-born person if debate is shut down? University authorities have to step in and do more to protect free speech and freedom of religion on our university campuses.”
Today the voice of secularism is uppermost whilst Christian values are largely being rejected by our places of learning. We must pray for the better days promised in Scripture. Then these establishments will once again educate and produce, under the Holy Spirit, godly men who will faithfully proclaim “the whole counsel of God”.
KHM
Edinburgh World Heritage Poster
An Edinburgh World Heritage poster shows a picture of a young woman standing near the statue of John Knox in the New College quadrangle, which she is completely ignoring. Knox has his right arm raised in the air, and a Bible in his left hand, and is proclaiming the Word of God. The girl is in a somewhat similar pose, also with her right arm raised, but has in it a mobile phone with which she is taking a “selfie”; and on her top is emblazoned the word, “Never”. The idea of the poster seems to be that these two figures
represent the old and the new in Edinburgh’s heritage. Knox represents sixteenth-century Scottish Presbyterianism, once dominant in Scotland; while the young woman represents the modern world. The significance of the word, “Never”, on the woman’s top is unexplained, but it seems to express a rejection of the dominion of Scottish Presbyterianism in former times.
The woman’s pose is certainly a good representation, not just of modern Edinburgh’s rejection of the gospel and the Christian Church, but of the usual human response to the Word of God throughout the world. The Word of God is being proclaimed, as the statue represents John Knox proclaiming it; but the world is studiously ignoring it, as the woman is paying no attention to the statue. Mankind, instead, is entirely pre-occupied with himself and with human affairs, as the woman is concerned only with the image of herself that she can see in the camera on her phone. At the same time, man does have an awareness of God in his heart, but he is utterly determined to persist in his rebellion; as the woman’s top is ceaselessly declaring her absolute refusal to all who see it. Furthermore there was a photographer who set up the photograph for this poster, and who was aware of the significance of John Knox, but who wanted to portray the rejection of that significance; and so there is a Devil who is well aware of the things of God, but who distracts men from it and who orchestrates their rebellion. This poster is a subtle and eloquent part of that rebellion.
DWBS