Pro-life groups discuss ‘true compassion’

Speakers urge those against assisted suicide to spend time with elderly, disabled

The B.C. Catholic

In a country where legal assisted suicide seems inevitable, groups against the practice are finding ways to spread the message that living is worthwhile.

Five speakers and 80 participants shared ways to reach out to the vulnerable during a workshop at the John Paul II Pastoral Centre titled True Compassion.

“If we are not at the bedsides of the elderly and the sick and the disabled, they could very easily be shepherded toward people, doctors, and ‘dying with dignity’ volunteers who will quickly make sure they get the end-of-life lethal injection that they might be asking for because their deeper needs are not being addressed,” said Natalie Sonnen, director of LifeCanada.

This pro-life organization, with about 80 member groups across the country, has launched Dying Healed. The program encourages people to spend time in hospitals and care homes, listening to, reading with, and watching television with people who are suffering.

“Volunteers sit quietly by the side of someone suffering to help them understand that their worth does not depend on what they can do, but rather simply that they are,” she said at the Jan. 30 event.

“In so doing, we show them that, even in the midst of suffering, we can be a source of love, compassion, belonging, and mutual gratitude.”

Speaker Sister John Mary Sullivan, FSE, said: “We need to be a community of people who never use the word ‘burden.'”

“Proponents of physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia state that one should have the right to die with dignity. This not only implies, it outright declares, that individuals who are suffering, who have lost their faculties, who are dependent on others, have no dignity.”

A family member of Sister Sullivan’s fits this description; about 15 years ago her brother-in-law’s mother was diagnosed with dementia and the once-active woman can now hardly communicate and relies on her husband to change her diapers.

“She would be a primary example of what others would say: no dignity.” Yet, Sister Sullivan said, her husband’s love for her has transformed their community.

“Her husband has gone from a good man to a heroic husband,” she said. “Their son, my brother-in-law, looks at his father and says: I want to be that. My sister sees that in her husband and knows a depth of love that she didn’t have before. Their children see this, and the neighbours see it. Their community is transformed.”

Sister Sullivan added that Christians can look to Christ on the cross to see evidence that sufferers have dignity. Mary, “with true compassion, stayed with Him.”

Doctor Margaret Cottle, a palliative-care physician for 27 years, agreed that being at the bedside is very important. “Ninety per cent of caring is showing up.”

She also pointed to Mary’s example of staying by the side of Christ crucified. “No one would say that she was doing nothing.”

Another way to act is to raise awareness about the issue among peers, said Anastasia Pearse, the executive director of National Campus Life Network, during a presentation.

“There’s such a need to educate people about the reality of physician-assisted suicide in our country.”

Their Question Abortion Project, she said, has met with success on university campuses. She suggested it be tweaked to address physician-assisted suicide and used across the country.

“It’s practical for a number of reasons. It’s simple,” she said. Participants stand outside with a clipboard and a few questions and ask passersby if they have time for a quick survey. The primary aim is to start a conversation, not to collect statistics.

“It’s such a useful means of outreach and an effective way to engage people in conversation.”

A postcard campaign by the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition was also launched at that event. The cards petition Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to enshrine in law that health-care professionals and institutions not have to provide assisted suicide in violation of their consciences.

“We’re in the damage-control segment of this whole battle now,” said Doctor Williard Johnston of the EPC.

“We must never lose sight of the fact that people who see no meaning in their existence and have no hope for the future, people who have an uncontrolled horror of disability, are a vulnerable group, through depression and anxiety, for premature loss of life.”