2023 4 Crystel Suicide is nothing less than a tragedy The World Health Organisation WHO has

  

4-Crystel-  Suicide is nothing less than a tragedy.  The World Health Organisation (WHO), has estimated that over 800,000 people die due to suicide every year.  Mental health, particularly depression, has been found to be the most important risk factor.  Depression totally makes sense to me, one must be out of their mind to make the decision to take their own life.  I don’t believe that anyone in their right mind would ever choose to take this route.

Suicide.  (2015).  Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/suicide

5-As Christians we hold suicide as morally wrong because we see it as a contradiction of our nature.  According to Meilaender (2013), the act of suicide can be seen as “an unwillingness to receive life moment by moment from the hand of God without ever regarding it as simply “our” possession.”  Suicide can be viewed as an attempt to bringing our life story to it’s conclusion.  It conveys a desire to be more like “creator than creature.”  As Christians, we believe that we exist always in relation to God; therefore, our life is not simply our possession to dispose of.  I completely agree with Meilaender’s analysis on suicide.  Life has been a gift given to us by God, he has a plan for us and we have no right to cut that plan short (Meilaender, 2013). 

In regard to euthanasia, Meilaender states: “I have no authority to excersise lordship over another’s life, and another has no authority to make me lord over his life or death.”  Christians should not request to cooperate in either assisted suicide or euthanasia.  We should always give our best efforts to care for our dying loved ones.  Often times, we’re tempted to believe that “life is our own to do with as we please.”  In addition, we may believe that “another’s life is their own to do with as they please.”  As Christians, we should see each one of our lives’ as a divine gift, we should guard it and respect it in others and in ourselves.  We can be inclined to “overemphasize our freedom and forget the limits of our finite condition.”  It’s hard to see people suffer and may think that euthanasia will bring relief.  In reality, euthanasia is an act of abandonment, not a compassionate relief from suffering.  Meilaender recommends maximizing care and standing besides those who suffer.  Life is a gift, we need to “always care, never kill” (Meilaender, 2013). 

Reference

Meilaender, G.  (2013).  Bioethics: A primer for Christians.  (Third ed.).  Grand Rapids, Michigan/ Cambridbe, U.K.

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6-Personally, I do agree that “suicide is morally wrong because they have seen in it a contradiction of our nature as creatures, an unwillingness to receive life moment by moment from the hand of God without ever regarding it as simply our possession” (Meilaender, 2013). In addition, according to Meilaender (2013), “from Christians, each person’s life is a divine gift and trust, taken up into God’s own eternal life in Jesus, to be guarded and respected in others and in oneself”. A personal life, is not simple belong to oneself, belong to the Creator and involves to other lives. Therefore, no one has the right to end the life of self or others.

Why do people commit suicide or euthanasia? Sufferings? As a mankind, suffering is a significant part of human life that can have meaning or purpose. God does not really solve or take away the problem of suffering; rather, God himself lives that problem and bears it (Meilaender, 2013). The great God of eternal life does not opt to eliminate sufferings. Therefore, as a mortal, one has no excuse to choose death to avoid sufferings or diseases. We need to comprehend the meaning or purpose of sufferings as well as live to glorify God’s will.

Reference:

Meilaender, G. (2013). In Bioethics: A Primer for Christians [Adobe Digital Edition] (3rd ed.). Retrieved from https://viewer.gcu.edu/UXWB22.

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