Assisted Dying
In mid-October, Kim Leadbeater MP introduced her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill in the House of Commons. It would allow people deemed to be terminally ill in England and Wales to receive help to kill themselves.
The Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, has always been open about his support for assisted dying and is backing the Bill. He can ensure that, if it passes the vote at the second reading on 29 November (which may have taken place before you read this), the Government will give the Bill time to pass all stages in the Commons and Lords, to allow it to become law. The Lords have proved to be not very compliant on this issue in the past, so we hope that, if necessary, they will prove their independence of thought again. Baroness Meacher’s Bill introduced in 2021 was rejected by the Lords.
The proponents of the Bill claim that the safeguards will be strict and iron-clad, obviating any misuse, abuse or coercion. One only needs to look at the slippage of safeguards for the Abortion Act to see that, with the passage of time, we have cause for serious concerns about how such a piece of legislation will expand and ease as the years go by. In opposing the plans, Plaid Cymru’s Delyth Jewel commented, “My fear with this motion – well, my terror really – is not so much how it will begin, as with how it will end”.
Canada is often cited as the exemplar by those who support assisted suicide, and yet that country’s experience illustrates the very real dangers of this kind of legislation. Just five years after legalising euthanasia in 2016, the requirement for a person to be terminally ill was scrapped, a court in Canada ruling that this restriction was incompatible with Canadian human rights and equality laws. In 2016 Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) accounted for 1000 deaths, in 2022 it accounted for 13 241 (4.1% of all deaths).
Archbishop Justin Welby said, “Even where there is no abuse, the pressure to end one’s life early could be intense and inescapable if the law were changed”, and “the right to end your life could all too easily and accidentally turn into a duty to do so”.
Baroness Grey-Thompson, a Paralympic gold medallist, said people say to her, “If my life was like yours, I’d end it,” and commented, “I have a massive amount of privilege. If you think that about my life, what do you think of other disabled people as well? So I am really worried.”
The UK Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has said that he intends to vote against the Bill because he wants to get to a point where palliative care – which in his opinion, is not good enough at the moment – will be much improved and give people a real choice. Leading palliative-care doctors have said that, with modern analgesia, pain is much easier to control than once it was. Baroness Finley, a professor of palliative care at Cardiff University School of Medicine, has said it is a myth that assisted dying is needed to avoid dying in pain: “It is high time that the argument that assisted dying is necessary to avoid a painful death is exposed as a fallacy”.
Scotland is not far behind the Commons in seeking to introduce assisted dying. Dr MacCormack of the Association of Palliative Medicine said, “There are fewer palliative care doctors in Scotland than there are MSPs, and without adequate palliative care the worry is that assisted suicide is not just a choice; it becomes a suggestion, which then becomes an expectation and then our vulnerable patients are at risk.”
The Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill has passed stage one of three on its way through the Scottish Parliament. There was a consultation stage to which the Church’s Religion and Morals Committee responded. The submission can be accessed on the Scottish Government website. The Bill (see Notes and Comments in this Magazine for February 2023 and August 2024) was introduced by Liam McArthur MSP, who believes adults who have an advanced and progressive terminal illness should be able to decide how and when their life should end. There is some discussion about whether the Scottish Parliament has the power to introduce such a bill but, if it achieves a majority at Holyrood, the Scottish Government will no doubt hope to come to some arrangement with Westminster.
Powerful and well-financed secular organisations such as Dignity in Dying; My Death, My Decision; and Humanists UK are bringing all their resources to bear on this issue.
The laws proposed by Holyrood and Westminster are diametrically opposed to God’s law. Psalm 139 tells us that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made”; our life is in the hands of the Almighty to do with as He wills. Those who believe in the preciousness and sanctity of life have a powerful ally who is accessible at a throne of grace. We should each of us plead with Him to thwart these pernicious endeavours.
FRD
Archbishop Welby and Lord Carey: Blind Leaders of the Blind
It must be exceedingly perplexing to many who are enquiring after the knowledge of the truth of God to hear and read again and again those who hold office in the visible Church of Christ unashamedly attacking and belittling the teaching of the Holy Scriptures. Instead of quoting from the Holy Scriptures and declaring, “Thus saith the Lord . . .”, as they ought, they arrogantly advocate their own erroneous opinions, which are contrary to the clear teaching of the Word of God.
It is evident such men are not faithful ministers of the gospel but blind leaders of the blind (Mt 15:14). Likewise, the churches which allow them to blaspheme so, and do not remove them from office, are not true churches but synagogues of Satan (see Rev 2:9 and 3:9). How desperate the situation is when those professing to be spiritual guides appointed by Christ to lead sinners, in the way that leads to heaven and eternal life, promote the wickedness of antichristian doctrine and practice that leads to death and eternal damnation!
Among the very many important issues before the nations at present, the following two are relevant to the above: the widespread, pernicious and ever-increasing influence of the evil of sodomy throughout society and the advance of the call for the legalising of euthanasia. It is in the context of these two evils in society that this article is written.
First, the present Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, after many years of equivocation on whether homosexual acts are sinful, has at last publicly stated that the Church of England and the worldwide Anglican communion have “evolved over the years” to now “include LGBTQ+ people more fully in the life of the church”.
This almost-unbelievable remark and the context in which it was given is commented on by a body of evangelicals within the Anglican communion, called the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC) as a “staggering set of statements”, in which “the Archbishop of Canterbury . . . admitted: ‘What the Archbishop of York and I, and the bishops, by a majority, by no means unanimous . . . where we’ve come to, is to say that all sexual activity should be within a committed relationship, whether it’s straight or gay’”. The CEEC further exclaims, “Provoking widespread disbelief, the Archbishop of Canterbury has used this interview to indicate his view that ‘sexual intimacy is no longer limited to marriage; sexual intimacy in gay relationships is OK; the Church should bless sexual relations outside of marriage’”. The CEEC concludes its initial introduction to its paper on the subject: “It is a devastating statement because it marks a clear departure from the doctrine of the Church of England, the Anglican communion, and [what] every other major Christian denomination across the world believe”.
It is no wonder that parts of the Anglican communion are separating from the Church of England for this and other grave departures from the teaching of the Bible. There are, not surprisingly, calls from within the Anglican communion for the Archbishop of Canterbury to resign over this matter.
Secondly, now that attention is being again drawn to euthanasia in our new parliament at Westminster, an article by The Daily Telegraph on the subject, written in May 2023 is particularly relevant. It drew attention to the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord George Carey, who had last year “called on the [then] government to set aside time for debate on a law to allow assisted dying, saying it is ‘profoundly Christian’ to ensure no one suffers against their will”.
The newspaper article explained, “Directly opposing the official view of the Church of England, Lord George Carey said statements used by those to oppose assisted dying – such as ‘life is sacred’, or, ‘Thou shalt not kill’ – were ‘too broad as principles to be very relevant to the issue’”.
The Daily Telegraph further reported that Lord Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury between 1991 and 2002, had written, “It is profoundly Christian to do all we can to ensure nobody suffers against their wishes. . . . Some people believe they will find meaning in their own suffering in their final months and weeks of life. I respect that, but it cannot be justified to expect others to share that belief.” He added, “It is within the capabilities of medical science to end intolerable suffering peacefully and that it is an act of great generosity, kindness and human love to help those when it is the will of the only person that matters – the sufferer himself. . . . I sincerely hope that the committee will send the message that we live in a compassionate society that has the courage to confront complexity, not one that bases its rules on fear or misunderstanding.”
What Charles Darwin spawned under the name of evolution, in the nineteenth century, developed into eugenics at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. It was most cruelly used by the Nazis in their Akton T4 programme at the time of the Holocaust, and later developed into what until recently was known as euthanasia. It is now sometimes called assisted suicide or dying with dignity, but whatever name man may give it, it is murder in the sight of Almighty God and is wholly condemned by the Sixth Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill” (Ex 20:13). Neither those who promote, nor those who desire, the use of this barbaric practice of ending life (be they archbishops or whoever) can believe in the reality of eternal damnation: the most awful end for all who die without saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb 10:31). The sufferings endured in this world, however great they may be, can bear no comparison to the far greater sufferings of the world to come, when those who blasphemously rebelled against their good and gracious Creator in this life will experience the infinite wrath of Almighty God in the next.
In the past, Justin Welby and George Carey professed to hold a scriptural position on these doctrines and practices. They had both commenced their ministries in the Church of England as evangelical Bible believers. It must have been thought that they then believed all the truths contained in their Bibles. However, whatever faith they had then, it evidently was not saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, the only Saviour of sinners, who said of His divinely inspired and infallible Holy Scriptures in His prayer to God His Father, “Thy Word is Truth” (Jn 17:17). Is there not a warning here for us and others? “See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven” (Heb 12:25). “Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall” (1 Cor 10:12). DPR
Floods in the Sahara
The proponents of “climate change” maintain (1) that the temperature of the earth’s surface is rising; (2) that this is caused by human activities such as burning fossil fuels and cutting down forests; and (3) that it is a disaster. Their highly aggressive dogmatism makes one question the first two assertions. The third one is sustained by the ongoing claims that whenever there is a destructive flood, drought, storm, hurricane, fire, cliff collapsing, or whatever, then climate change is responsible.
Recently, there were floods in the Sahara Desert. Heavy rain from a cyclone on September 7 and 8 drenched parts of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya. Several usually dry lakes filled up, and there were still impressive lakes a month later. Satellite images showed large stretches of the Sahara swathed in green. One news source said that “more extreme rainfall events could be expected in the Sahara in the future, according to recent research, as fossil fuel pollution continues to heat up the planet and disrupt the water cycle”. Perhaps there is “climate change”, but it is not all bad. It is hard to accept that a huge desert becoming fertile would be an “ecological disaster”. Rock paintings of crocodiles in the Sahara show that parts of it were fertile in the past. God turns “fat lands to barrenness”, on account of “the sins of those that dwell therein” (Ps 107:34, metrical). Perhaps He is now restoring the “dry land” of the Sahara to “water springs” (v 33), while scourging proud and ungodly men elsewhere through the weather.
DWBS