The following article came to our attention via MercatorNet , which stands for reframing ethical and policy debates in terms of human dignity, not dollars and cents or political calculation. They specialise in navigating modern complexities with a focus on human dignity and the family. Cardus Law is a research body that is particularly interested the role of religious freedom in sustaining an ordered society where citizens’ faith informs a vibrant public debate and where the public and private expression of religious faith helps to shape our common life.
By Andrew Bennett, program director for Cardus Law, Canada
In a truly pluralist democracy, acceptance of difference must include the right to hold different theological and different ethical and moral positions even when they go against the prevailing spirit of our age. So long as these views are held and advanced peacefully and do not advocate physical violence that would violate human dignity, they must be allowed to inhabit the public space.
We must reject an illiberal totalitarianism that seeks to establish socially correct and acceptable beliefs treating any peacefully held contrary view as deviant and something to be silenced. There must be no totalitarianism of accepted belief or accepted opinion in our country.
It is not by sheer accident that freedom of religion or conscience appears as the first fundamental freedom in s. 2a of the Charter. If a citizen does not enjoy the foundational freedom to live and exercise religious beliefs both publicly and privately, and to have this freedom vigorously defended by all of our institutions, then we cannot build a truly pluralist and diverse society where difference is viewed in a positive light.
A true pluralism must embrace and enable difference, but not simply a subset of differences that may be permitted and emboldened by a given set of elites at a given moment in our history. This is an illiberal pluralism that embraces a closed secularism where the state imposes values and dictates what religious beliefs are publicly permissible.
To paraphrase a prominent Catholic bishop:
Democracy has many merits, but it does not determine the truth.
The freedom to practice one’s deeply held religious faith both publicly and privately is a freedom that implicitly advances and supports this true pluralism by protecting and continually upholding difference. To champion religious freedom is also to implicitly accept that there are those in our common life who will hold and will promote beliefs, theological and philosophical, moral, and ethical, that many of us will vehemently reject. And that’s okay. It is the proper role of the State to ensure that no one religious belief system, or for that matter a secular belief system, dictates what one must believe and what one must do.
All faith communities along with political and ideological communities must commit to inhabiting the public space in peace. They must commit to engage in activities that have as their ultimate goal the promotion of human flourishing, recognition of human dignity, and an acceptance of different beliefs co-existing in the public square.
Freedom of religion or conscience is essential in the development and defence of a diverse society where human beings are able to flourish and have their dignity acknowledged. How then does religious freedom reveal human dignity? Freedom of religion relates directly to the metaphysical need of every human being to freely contemplate and adhere to beliefs that answer these questions: “Who am I? Who am I in relationship to you? Who am I in relationship to the country and world in which I live? And, who am I in relationship to God, or to a particular philosophy to which I choose to adhere?”
It can be argued that these questions define the relationship between religious freedom and human dignity. If our concept of freedom is purely one of economic, social, and/or political freedom divorced from this existential freedom then our participation in society will be frustrated. How we understand ourselves in a metaphysical sense cannot be divorced from our political, social, and economic selves. Indeed, in most of the world religious faith defines political, social, and economic action. All of these freedoms speak to human freedom itself and its defence so as to enable human flourishing.
If Muslims, Christians, Sikhs or Jews…are constrained in living out their faith through practice, they will become increasingly marginalised and our society will be increasingly atomised. The marginalisation of people of faith and the diverse beliefs they profess can have two consequences, both of which hamper the further strengthening of our common life:
Firstly, such a marginalisation impoverishes our public debate by pushing out valuable perspectives drawn from deep wells of religious tradition. In so doing, people who profess these traditions will view themselves as being undervalued within our political life, and the religious beliefs they deeply hold as being unworthy of public consideration. Their ability to full exercise their citizenship is diminished as a result.
Secondly, as people of faith and their communities feel increasingly vulnerable and believe that they can no longer participate in the common life due to unreasonable constraints placed upon their faith and conscience, they may choose to check out of mainstream society altogether. While this may allow them to live their faith and support their faith-based institutions more-or-less independently, it represents a grave loss to our common life and is essentially a failure of our political society to embrace these citizens.
The State that acknowledges and respects religious freedom as being intrinsically linked to human dignity is a State that upholds true religious freedom. It respects the sovereignty of religious bodies and faith communities to exercise faith freely and in good conscience in both public and private lives. Likewise members of all faith communities must respect the values of our liberal democratic society, in particular, the rule of law exercised by the state insomuch as those laws are just, do not counter the moral law, and are ordered towards the common good and the flourishing of all members of society.
A true pluralism respects disagreement, often profound disagreement, between people of different faiths, ideologies, and backgrounds. In building our common life we must seek to build a society in which people flourish and are able to live their lives of faithfully, both publicly and privately. In building this common life there must be the space to differ and not to defer, to have the freedom to live a public faith and not be driven to privatise one’s faith in order to be accepted in the public square.
A liberal democracy needs to be strong enough in its embrace of the rule of law, freedom, and human rights to guarantee that religious differences and differences in belief more generally – differences that often have sharp edges – can exist.
A liberal democracy protects and opens wide the public square for these disagreements to exist. The public square also beckons us, calling us to meet each other there, in our differences and our diversity, and to there encounter our shared humanity in solidarity with one another.
Andrew Bennett is Senior Fellow at Cardus and program director for Cardus Law. Reproduced with permission from Convivium.
Convivium means living together. It is an online space that brings together citizens of differing convictions and religious confessions to contend for the role of faith in our common life.
What’s the difference between Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide?
Euthanasia is an intervention undertaken with the intention of ending a life to relieve suffering, for example, a lethal injection administered by a doctor
Assisted suicide is any act that intentionally helps another person kill themselves, for example by providing them with the means to do so, most commonly by prescribing a lethal medication
When David Seymour’s bill was drawn, National and Whanganui MP Chester Borrows said he was firmly against it [the bill].
We have a horrific record on suicide and I think it sends a message that sometimes it is okay to top yourself. And I disagree with that.
Economic Development Minister Simon Bridges said he was likely to vote against it, but may vote for it to go to a select committee so it could be properly debated. “Ultimately life is sacred and I think there are … ‘thin edge of the wedge’ arguments that concern me.”
What will that debate look like? The world has progressed since Maryan Street’s ‘End-of-Life Choice Bill’ was dropped. Views have changed and euthanasia laws in other countries have evolved over the past four years. Here’s a quick look at recent articles in the media if you want to consider the trajectory euthanasia laws have taken.
Did you read the first article in the list? Here are are some of the key points that need highlighting:
The Dutch are complacent about their famous law, he says. But there is no room for complacency. Under current legislation, euthanasia is only legal if a doctor believes that three conditions have been met: (1) the request must be voluntary and deliberate; (2) there must be unbearable suffering with no hope of improvement; and (3) there must no reasonable alternative to euthanasia. However, as euthanasia has sunk its roots deeper and deeper into Dutch medicine, the second and third conditions have shrivelled up. Patients define what is unbearable and they define what is a reasonable alternative. Unhappiness can be unbearable and a nursing home may not be a reasonable alternative. So, as one ethicist has observed, requirements (2) and (3) “add little to the requirement of a voluntary and thoughtful request”. Autonomy has trumped medicine. As a result, the number of euthanasia cases roughly tripled between 2007 and 2016, from 2000 to 6000.
One sign of the changing times is the rapid expansion of the services of the End of Life Clinic Foundation (Stichting Levenseindekliniek). This organisation offers euthanasia to patients whose own doctors have refused. They never offer to treat the underlying illness, whether it is physical or mental.
Last year, Dr Chabot points out, doctors from the End of Life Clinic each performed about one euthanasia every month. “What happens to doctors for whom a deadly injection becomes a monthly routine?” he asks. Now the End of Life Clinic is recruiting psychiatrists to service the mentally ill and demented. One obvious problem is that there is a shortage of good psychiatric help in the Netherland – which tends to take a long time have an effect, in any case – because of budget cuts.
Dr Chabot is deeply sceptical about euthanasia for the demented: “we are dealing with a morally problematic act: how do you kill someone who does not understand that he will be killed?” How? It turns out that sometimes a relative or doctor secretly laces their food or drink with a sedative to make it easier to give them a lethal injection. In one notorious case last year, the sedative didn’t work and relatives pinned the terrified woman to the bed while the doctor gave the lethal injection. Dr Chabot was astonished to discover that “surreptitious administration of medication has previously occurred, but has never been mentioned in an annual report.” Isn’t anyone paying attention to these developments, Dr Chabot asks.
Euthanasia is presented as a solution for those who are suffering unbearable pain, by allowing them to exercise their right to take their own life and not be forced to live with their current or progressing condition.
Is depression a medical condition?
Here’s what the New Zealand Ministry of Health says,
Depression is a mental illness.. [it] can range from being a mild illness, to a severe one – where you can lose interest in life and the things you used to enjoy.
Suicidal thoughts are a key symptom of depression.
What’s Euthanasia? Asking someone else [a physician] to intervene and take your life because you are unable to do so yourself.
“… a rose. By any other name, would smell as sweet.” ~ Romeo and Juliet, Act II Scene II
Are there other solutions to this problem?
We need to stop victimising people facing ‘unbearable pain’ or ‘extenuating circumstances’ and reach out in love. Think differently. Look for alternative solutions and, if you can’t find one, make one!
Did you catch the story in Stuff that came out the day after the bill was pulled from the ballot?
John Darnley says the first time he rolled down the street with Avis on the front of his bike, she loved it. Photo: Kevin Stent / Fairfax Media
“There was a time when visitors would come for miles just to chat with Avis Darnley.
But as Parkinson’s disease has melted away the muscles in her jaw and throat, left her in a wheelchair and stolen her ability to speak, life has got smaller.
Most days she was left with just her front room, her television, and husband John.
Until John decided it was time they both got on with living.”
John and Avis Darnley’s story demonstrates that there can be creative solutions to improving one’s quality of life.
Hospice New Zealand does not support a change in the law to legalise assisted dying in any form. Nor do we consider that a change in the law would be in the best interests of the people we care for.
We believe Government should be investing in palliative care, increasing access to care and support not legalising euthanasia. Only when all New Zealanders have ready access to expert end-of-life care can a balanced debate begin. We support that all New Zealanders have the right to choose where they die.
The Nathaniel Centre played an instrumental role in the previous attempt to legalise Euthanasia in New Zealand.
It goes without saying that Family First will play a very public role in this debate, and that Maxim Institute to provide well-researched information for the country to consider.
David Seymour’s private member’s bill is based on an illusion. It assumes that it’s possible to create safeguards around assisted suicide practices that can prevent wrongful deaths. However, international evidence has shown that there is no reliably safe way to legalise euthanasia or assisted suicide.
Need more clarification around the euthanasia debate?
Check out this resource by John Kleinsman
Examples of actions which are not euthanasia are often used to argue for law change which is euthanasia. This brief article aims to clarify some of the terms and issues in the hope that we can prevent this from happening.
Andy and I aren’t qualified marriage counsellors, but we invest a lot of our time coaching couples in trouble. We love seeing couples grow back together again. However, last year, after many hours with one couple, the husband made a comment that made us realise it was not going to end well. He said, “I just don’t trust her”.
He wasn’t talking about his wife being unfaithful. Over the course of their married life together he’d felt betrayed time and time again until his trust had been eroded to the point that he felt his heart wasn’t safe with her.
I wanted to know when he had first started shutting his heart down to her, and what had occurred to make him do so, but he couldn’t tell me. Sadly, in this case, they didn’t make it.
Trustworthiness is essential in marriage. Our hearts have to feel safe with one another, don’t they?
John Gottman, relationship ‘master’, believes that in marriage, we’re all quietly asking the same questions:
Can I trust you to respect me?
Can I trust you to do what you say you’ll do?
Can I trust you to keep my confidence?
Can I trust you to work hard for our family?
Can I trust you to choose me over your friends?
Can I trust you to be financially faithful?
Can I trust you to help around the house – to help with the kids?
Can I trust you not to cheat on me – to be sexually faithful?
Can I trust you not to use my weaknesses against me?
So how do we build trust so that our hearts remain open and we feel safe?
Gottman, says trust is built in the small interactions of everyday life; when we choose to ‘turn towards’ our spouse in daily moments.
Every time a couple interacts they have a choice to either ‘turn toward’ or ‘turn away’ from their spouse. Each time a couple ‘turns toward’ they are building trust.
Let me give you a personal example from my own life.
We had some friends coming over for dinner and I was enjoying preparing them a special meal. Andy was in the study working on the computer, and I knew he was waiting on some blood results and was worried. As I headed into the study to get my recipe book I heard Andy groan “Uh oh”.
I remember in that split second thinking, “I really don’t want to deal with your health issues right now. Maybe I could just pretend I didn’t hear that and just sneak back down to the kitchen.”
But because I work at FamilyLife and travel around NZ teaching this stuff :), I checked my attitude. You see, I knew in that moment, I had a choice to either turn towards Andy, or turn away.
I walked into the study, put my arm around his shoulder and asked, “Tell me the bad news.” I was so glad I did because in that very moment Andy needed my support and reassurance. He needed to know that, once again, I will be there for him and that he can trust me with whatever “uh oh’s” come our way.
Can I encourage you, rather than turn away from your partner in those small difficult moments, instead choose to ‘turn toward’. It will build trustworthiness in marriage which is an antidote to conflict and foundational to healthy happy marriages that last.
Nikki
Help for Today. Hope for Tomorrow – visit FAMILYLIFE NZ
‘A church that doesn’t have disabled people in it, is a disabled church,’ says Di Willis, director of Elevate Disability Trust. Di describes herself as ‘very ordinary’, but it’s been an extraordinary life—among extraordinary people.
by Ingrid Barratt (c) ‘War Cry’ magazine, 11 February 2017, pages 6-9
You can read ‘War Cry’ on their website, at your nearest Salvation Army church or centre, or subscribe through Salvationist Resources
Clive was a young man with severe cerebral palsy. One day he announced that he wanted to preach. Di Willis is honest that she thought, ‘My goodness, no one will be able to understand him.’ However, Elevate advocated for him to be given an opportunity to preach, with an interpreter translating for the congregation. ‘You could hear a pin drop, it was so powerful,’ recalls Di. From that day, an unlikely but gifted preacher was born.
This is a lesson for the church, points out Di. When we assume that people with disabilities cannot have the same spiritual giftings we do, we not only short-change them, but we debilitate the body of Christ.
This is also true of people with intellectual disabilities. ‘They may be intellectually disabled, but they are not spiritually disabled,’ reflects Di. ‘Jesus said we have to be like small children to come to him. People with intellectual disabilities have that pure faith, and they wake the church up.’
Plus, they can get away with things we would never get away with, laughs Di. She points to a church in Taupo that is proactive in including disabled people in its ministries. ‘A group of intellectually disabled people have the task of taking the offering. They will come and stand beside you until you put something in the bag or tell them to go away. We could never get away with that!’ It’s a light-hearted perspective on a profound issue: that God uses the weak things of the world to confound the wise.
Sowing the seeds
When I ask Di where she got her passion for people with disabilities, she simply answers, ‘God.’ Yet, as so often happens, God was planting the seeds from the very beginning.
‘I was tested when I was about nine because I was failing school,’ explains Di. ‘They found I was slightly slow in my learning. So I was sent to a special school as a boarder. I had a year of crying the whole time, I was so homesick.’ Yet, looking back, Di realises the school gave her a love of people with disabilities.
It’s not surprising, then, that when Di left school she became an occupational therapist. But it wasn’t until she came to New Zealand from the United Kingdom ‘on an adventure’ that her life changed forever.
‘I was very social and got drunk a lot, and it was a turbulent time,’ remembers Di. ‘I had a real void within, and deep down, I really wanted to know God. A friend invited me to go to the Billy Graham crusade. Well, my friend didn’t end up coming, but I went along and I had an amazing conversion. I was completely changed.’
At the time, she was working at Middlemore Hospital where she was inspired by Bev, a tetraplegic woman who was a Christian. ‘God showed me there should be a ministry for people with disabilities, both Christian and non-Christian,’ says Di.
The idea kept playing in the back of her mind as she got married and began a family. One day, Di decided to pick up the phone and call Bev, who had recently left hospital after two years and was struggling to adjust, as well as look after her three children. Di said, ‘I want to bring people with disabilities to your place.’
Her friend replied that just that morning, she had prayed to God, ‘Lord, only bring the people to my place that you want to be there.’ And so, a ministry was born.
Revelation and revival
Another friend, Margie, who has cerebral palsy, also helped begin the ministry. Margie went to America to be healed by a famous healing evangelist, but came back devastated that she had not been healed. ‘We were there helping her pick up the pieces,’ says Di.
But out of that experience, Margie went to Bible College where God appeared to her in an awe-inspiring vision: ‘She saw Jesus on a white horse, just like in Revelation, and he gave her an enormous vision of the work he wanted to do with disabled people.
‘We were overawed and didn’t have a clue what to do. We had to really trust God—and whenever the Lord showed us things, we did it. We got criticised to the nth degree for not having this or that, but we just did it. The Lord was so faithful to us, and it just grew and grew and loads of people became Christians. It was a revival really.’
One of their dreams was to hold a Christian camp for people with disabilities, and they nervously booked a venue for 26 people. Forty years later, Elevate’s national camps attract between 300-400 people, with branches throughout the country.
Among its many ministries, Elevate oversees ‘Christian Fellowship for the Disabled’ for people with mainly physical disabilities, ‘Joy Ministries’ for people with intellectual disabilities, ‘Torch Outreach’ for the blind or visually impaired, and ‘Emmanuel Support’ for families of children with disabilities, as well as an Auckland-based drop-in centre brimming with people daily.
Part of the body
‘I sometimes say that if the Church was really doing its job, we wouldn’t need this ministry at all,’ says Di—although she has also seen first-hand that Elevate allows people to be completely accepted, without having to explain themselves or fight to fit in.
Still, the aim of Elevate is to see people with disabilities not merely surviving in churches, but thriving. Di admits there is still discrimination—although she hesitates to use the word —against people with disabilities.
Although many churches have good intentions, there are subtle barriers: ‘I have a bee in my bonnet about churches where there is a stage and no ramp up to it. It’s assuming that people who use a wheelchair, crutches or a walker don’t have anything to offer up the front,’ says Di. ‘It’s great if you have a back entrance for the disabled; it’s even better if they can come in the front like everyone else.’
Di shocked the vicar of a traditional church when she suggested they cut a pew in half, so that a person in a wheelchair could sit in the middle of the church, next to friends and family—instead of right down the back or right up the front. Yet, there are also many churches that have showed enormous imagination. ‘There was a boy in a wheelchair who wanted to go to youth group, but their youth room was upstairs. So they changed the location, and started meeting downstairs, and he knew he belonged,’ remembers Di.
Part of her job is to advocate for people so they can go to the church they choose, and be full participants in its ministries. Intellectually-disabled people are great door greeters. Other people with physical disabilities may be prayers, encouragers, preachers and teachers.
Churches have to do some work to include people with disabilities—such as a roster for those needing transport or getting some advice around setting boundaries for people with intellectual disabilities. ‘I love it when a minister rings me and says, “I have someone in my church with a disability and I need some help.” I think, ‘Good on you!’
Elevate can help with practical tips for encouraging and involving people with disabilities. Ultimately, though, ‘it’s your attitude and heart that’s really important,’ says Di.
The bottom line is that people with disabilities have a lot to offer the Church through their own unique giftings. ‘You don’t have to have a ministry to the disabled, you just need to include people with disabilities in your ministries,’ sums up Di.
More than ordinary
Last year, Di was given an Unsung Hero ‘Missional Living’ Award by the New Zealand Christian Network, for her tireless work over 40 years. ‘It was such a great thing for the ministry. I’m just a very ordinary person, so God gets the glory,’ she says.
I can’t help but argue that Di is not entirely ordinary. If Elevate shows us anything, it’s that in God’s Kingdom, everyone is extraordinary. And God, who is able, can do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20).
Need help? |Elevate can help you find practical ways to include people with disabilities in your church
Get involved | You can volunteer with Elevate through prayer support, lending a hand at one of their camps, being a friend, donating and more. Go to elevatecdt.org.nz
A law professor defends physicians’ right to conscientious objection
By Professor Michael Quinlan, 18 May 2017
As abortion, euthanasia and other controversial procedures become more widespread, conscientious objection for healthcare workers is becoming a flashpoint for controversy throughout the Western world. Some doctors and ethicists have argued that conscientious objection itself is unethical because doctors are required to fulfil any legal request that their patients make.
MercatorNet interviewed Professor Michael Quinlan, dean of the law school at the Sydney campus of the University of Notre Dame Australia, about this contentious issue. He has just published an article on the situation in Australian jurisdictions.
MercatorNet: Opponents of conscientious objection complain that patients could suffer if doctors refuse to provide a service. But how about doctors? Do they suffer if they cannot live consistently with their consciences?
Michael Quinlan: Yes, they do and in a number of ways. Some doctors faced with provisions which prevent them from living consistently with their conscience will retire or move to a State which does respect conscience. Not all doctors will be in a financial position to take those steps, so some will comply with the law – after all generally speaking we expect citizens, and especially professionals, to comply with the law.
Just as there is growing evidence of what is called “moral distress” being experienced by ex-servicemen and women, so there is growing evidence that health practitioners who act against their conscience can suffer from “moral distress.”
This is not just a bad feeling. Moral distress can adversely impact on self-respect, self-esteem, patient care and job satisfaction. Feelings of helplessness, frustration, guilt, sorrow and anxiety can manifest in physical and mental illness. Moral distress can cause burnout and early retirement from the profession. It can also lead to desensitising of one’s conscience and to increased risk of doctors developing indifference to patients and a weakening of their ability make ethical decisions.
Most discussions of conscientious objection to abortion frame it as a moral judgement on the procedure. But isn’t it also possible to see it as bad medicine – the wrong answer to a woman’s distress?
There is certainly evidence that some women do suffer adversely from induced abortions. Symptoms can include depression, low self-esteem, self-destructive behaviours, relationship difficulties, substance abuse, suicidal ideation and anxiety. Such symptoms are not confined to women who undergo late term terminations and emerge after short or long periods of time have elapsed.
Reardon, Coleman and Short’s study of medical evidence from half a million women in Denmark found significantly higher mortality rates within one to ten years of woman who have had early or late abortions. Women should be informed of these medical risks but they should also be given real alternatives to consider and those alternatives – material and medical – should be real.
Nobody likes “conscience clauses”. Those who appeal to them resent being treated as an exception; those who oppose them think they are unfair. Do conscience clauses have a future or will they become narrower and narrower and fade away?
I don’t know that it is true to say that nobody likes “conscience clauses.” Conscience protections are actually not all that uncommon in Australia. Parliamentarians in the major political parties at least enjoy conscience votes in issues such as abortion. Federal law and the laws of most states and territories provide privilege from disclosure of confidential religious confessions. Conscientious objectors to military service are protected from conscription in the Commonwealth Defence Act.
The law protects those whose religious beliefs prevent them from voting at all or from voting in an election if it is held on a particular day of the week from fines for failing to vote. The Australian Cricket Board was able to accommodate the religious objections of a Muslim player to having to wear a uniform promoting alcohol. The Canterbury-Bankstown Rugby League club was willing (at least until recently) to accommodate the religious objections of one of its star players to playing football on a Sunday. Medical professionals of conscience need to be clear on their position and make their voices heard – in their professional organisations – but also in the public square.
Conscientious objection must have some limits. Can a Jehovah Witness doctor refuse to do blood tranfusions? Or a Muslim doctor refuse to examine women?
In a multi-faith, multi-racial and multi-cultural pluralist country like Australia I think that it is generally reasonable to accommodate positions held by medical professionals – and other citizens – as much as possible. Some issues may be able to be accommodated in some but not other circumstances.
Perhaps in a large public hospital with sufficient staff it might be possible for patients to be well cared for without requiring a doctor who has a conscientious objection to blood transfusions or to examining particular patients to be accommodated. Of course there do need to be some limits on conscientious objection. As Professor Iain Benson has observed “[a]ny legal regime is necessarily involved in line drawing and there is nothing inherently offensive about that.”
Some have argued that if doctors object to performing legal procedures, they should find another job as a plumber or child care worker? How would you respond?
Those who make this argument tend to ignore the fact that we do live in a multi-faith, multi-racial and pluralist society. Just as there are some doctors who have a conscientious objection to abortion, so too are there patients who have such an objection. Patients have a right to obtain medical treatment from doctors who understand their religious worldview and who share that viewpoint.
Policies and legislative provisions that discourage “pro-life” doctors from joining or remaining in the profession may deprive patients from access to the services of health practitioners who share their views about the value of embryonic human life. Some patients would never countenance the termination of a pregnancy no matter the risks to their own physical health or no matter the physical or other challenges that their child might face. Such women who do not want to feel pressured into termination because their unborn child might be a Downs syndrome child or be pressured into a “selective reduction” if they are carrying twins.
Such patients want their doctors to support them in their decisions and to give them and their children whole hearted and supportive medical care. Provisions which force doctors out of the profession act to reduce – not to increase – patient choice.
What are the weak points in the armour of resolutely secular thinkers who argue that doctors should perform all legally requested procedures?
This sort of argument actually tends only to be made in relation to abortion services. Elective surgery is not normally something that doctors must do. So, for example, many paediatric doctors refuse to perform circumcisions on baby boys. Essentially these arguments seek to put patient autonomy as a governing principle and to assert that doctors owe obligations to society because society gives them something of a monopoly.
When you think about it, though, no one seems to argue that doctors must subjugate their own interests entirely to those of their patients. No one argues that doctors must carry out every legal operation a patient requests or that they must provide every legal medication that a patient requests.
We expect – we want – we need – doctors to be ethical people who are not driven solely by profit. We need doctors to refuse to carry out medical procedures which might earn them money but which they think would not be best for their patient’s health and wellbeing. We don’t expect and we don’t actually want our doctors to give us antibiotics that we don’t actually need. We want them to tell us what they think is actually in our best interests even though our Google inspired medical view conflicts with theirs.
We don’t expect doctors to subordinate their interests to those of their patients generally. We don’t expect them to work for free or to make house calls or never to take holidays at their patient’s request. Those who want all doctors to provide abortion services must be honest in their arguments. If they want to argue that all doctors must provide abortion services – but not other medical services – they must explain what exactly makes abortion different and overcome the powerful arguments against such compulsion.
This article by Professor Michael Quinlan was originally published on MercatorNet.com under a Creative Commons Licence. If you enjoy this article, visit MercatorNet.com for more or click here to read the article on their site.
Professor Michael Quinlan is Dean of the School of Law, Sydney at The University of Notre Dame Australia.
The following essay, by Doug Mainwaring, originally appeared at Public Discourse: Ethics, Law and the Common Good and has been reprinted with permission. The original post can be viewed here >>
This world does not need men to selfishly take whatever we want, especially if the price is the welfare of our children. Our children don’t need superheroes—just quiet, unsung, ordinary, everyday heroes who answer to the name “Daddy.”
When I was taking my first few steps out of the closet in the late 1990s, a guy who called himself Tex offered me a short version of his life story over drinks at a Dupont Circle bar. The conversation took an unanticipated turn: he explained that his current partner had moved halfway across the country, leaving behind an ex-wife and kids. Tex would sometimes answer the house phone (this was before cell phones) and would hear a small voice cautiously ask, “May I please speak to my Daddy?” This was his partner’s eight-year-old daughter calling from somewhere in the Rocky Mountains. Tex said that it troubled him deeply that his partner’s daughter had to ask permission of a stranger in order to speak with her daddy.
When I think of this little girl, my thoughts drift to folks like Alana Newman and others who have anonymous sperm donors for fathers, many of whom have daily asked that same question in their hearts. May I please speak to my Daddy?
When I started speaking out about the dangers of same-sex marriage for children, I found it difficult to get proponents of genderless marriage to engage in intellectually honest one-on-one discussions. Then I realized: at least half the people who wanted to clobber me with bumper sticker slogans were products of broken marriages.
In early 2013, following my participation in a panel discussion, a young man accused me of being unfair to gays, lesbians, and their children. So I took a chance and asked him point blank: “Did your parents divorce when you were a child?”
He was a little stunned by the personal question, but he answered, “Yes.” The smugness left his face.
“Did you live with your mother?”
“Yes.”
“Did you see much of your father?”
“No. I almost never saw him.”
“Did you miss him? Did you wish you could be around him more?”
“Yes. Of course,” he answered, with a bit of wistfulness.
“Did your parents’ divorce increase your happiness—or your sadness?”
“Sadness.”
“So your parents dismantled your home and set up two new structures that put their needs first, not yours. In fact, they were structures guaranteeing your continued unhappiness. You learned to live with it, because as a child you had no control whatsoever over their actions, but these new structures weren’t necessarily built with your best interest in mind.”
“Well, no. I didn’t get to vote on the matter. I was a kid.”
“Exactly. So why would it be different for children of gays and lesbians who are denied either their father or mother? Do you really think two moms or two dads is exactly the same as having both mom and dad around to love and care for you? Seriously? Would having an extra mom around the house really have satisfied you, or would you still have an unanswered yearning in your heart for your Dad?”
“I see.”
“Then why would you want to condemn other children to be fatherless? Or motherless?”
He got it. He didn’t like it, but he got it—and then he walked away. I have no idea if he changed his mind, but at least he had finally actually heard and listened to an opposing point of view—one that resonated with him.
As I walked away, I thought to myself, “To be intellectually honest, I can’t keep speaking publicly against the dangers of genderless marriage without also simultaneously speaking about the objective evil of divorce for kids.” Divorce is an exponentially larger, far more pervasive threat to children than the prospect of gays raising children without moms and lesbians raising children without dads. I sighed. There is a lot to undo and set straight.
The Prodigal Dad
After my wife and I had been divorced for a few years, it was not unusual for her to call and ask me to drive to her house because our youngest son was out of control. When I would arrive, I found turmoil. He had gotten angry about something, and that had triggered a rage completely disproportionate to the issue. He would yell and scream and kick, then isolate himself in his bedroom. No trespassers allowed. It was gut-wrenching to witness this. Thankfully, he would calm down after a while and return to normal.
His rage would, in turn, trigger discussions with my ex-wife. What were we going to do about his behavioral problem? Did he require medication? Did he need to be spanked? Did he need psychological help?
After this happened a few times it became abundantly clear to me exactly what he needed. Our son did not have a behavioral problem. He needed just one thing: he needed his parents to get back together and to love each other. The slicing and dicing of our family had thrust unbearable stress on this four-year-old’s tender psyche. His Dad and Mom were the culprits responsible for this, yet we were approaching this as if it were his problem.
Our little boy bore no blame, but I sure did.
It took a few more years for my ex-wife and me to fully come to our senses. In the meantime, our kids came to live with me. This was not a solution, it was simply a stopgap means of de-escalating an uncomfortable situation. While this solved some problems, it created others and remained a wholly unsatisfying answer.
To justify remaining divorced and maintaining two households, we adults were enforcing a charade, demanding everyone else around us—especially our own children—pretend that our selfish pursuits and our inability to “work things out” were just fine. In reality, we had done nothing more than slough off our problems and dysfunction on our kids. We were alleviating our own stresses by heaping them on our children.
Wonderfully, after a dozen years, we finally dropped the pretense and are once again husband and wife, married with children. There has been a lot of healing since then, some of which has been a complete surprise. And we’ll never know what additional potential difficulties our kids have been spared.
A Lesson from Hollywood
Never before in history have children been born with the explicit purpose of being deprived of either a mom or a dad. Yet children who are brought into this world to satisfy the wants of gay and lesbian couples enter the world in exactly this way. They live with the knowledge that one of their biological parents will remain forever an enigma, a phantom.
Until recently, children were viewed as a pure gift from God. Now new laws undefining marriage are producing the sad result of undefining children as well, reducing them to chattel-like sources of fulfillment. On one side, their family tree consists not of ancestors, but of a small army of anonymous surrogates, donors, and attorneys who pinch-hit for the absent gender in genderless marriages.
Though it may seem a strange source, the 1998 Disney movie The Parent Trap (a remake of the 1961 classic starring Hayley Mills) can teach us a lot about kids growing up with two gay dads or two lesbian moms.
In the movie, two girls who look remarkably alike, Hallie Parker and Annie James, bump into each other at an exclusive New England summer camp. They soon discover that they are twins who were separated shortly after birth, and they concoct a scheme to switch identities and trade places. Each so desperately wants to meet her missing parent that she is willing to change appearance, hairstyle, mannerisms, voice, and accent and to move to a foreign country just to have a few surreptitious, stolen days with the mom or dad for whom she longs.
Hallie lives with her dad in California wine country in a beautiful hillside mansion with a swimming pool and stables. She has a handsome dad who is a fabulously successful vintner. In short, she has everything—but she still yearns for the mom who has been denied her. Meanwhile, Annie lives in a mansion in a posh London suburb. Her beautiful mom is a world-famous dress designer. She has servants to wait on her and a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce at her disposal. Yet Annie likewise yearns for the dad who has been denied her.
Both these girls lead enviable fairytale lives. But viewers watching this film, the majority of whom enjoy far less material wealth and security, feel sorry for both girls, because each is missing a parent. This irony is precisely the point of the movie.
It’s interesting, too, that Hallie’s aunt lives in the home and serves as a sort of surrogate mother figure, while Annie’s maternal grandfather lives with her and her mom, serving as a paternal figure for Annie. Even though both these wonderful, upbeat, loving single-parent households have a closely related, caring family member of the opposite sex present, a Grand-Canyon-sized hole persists in Annie’s and Hallie’s hearts.
In the movie, adults are responsible for dividing children. In the case of children produced for genderless marriage, adults are responsible for depriving them. Deprivation is permanently, irrevocably etched into the hearts and souls of human beings created for genderless marriages. Children who are engineered for gay marriages face impoverished lives from the day they are born, as two men snatch a baby from their rented surrogate’s womb, denying their child perhaps the only opportunity he or she might have had to experience a mother’s embrace. This missed opportunity is as close as their child will ever have come to touching someone who is, sort of, their mom.
As she grows older, her yearning for mom will be dismissed, hushed, laughed away, and not taken seriously. After all, dad sees no need for a woman in his life. Why should his little girl or boy? To yearn for a mom becomes an insult to the wifeless man or male couple raising her. Better to suffer in silence than risk upsetting dad or dads by bringing up the greatest of taboo subjects.
Each one of us needs to thoroughly think through the unintended, unconsidered consequences that lurk—or are purposely obscured—behind our acceptance of genderless marriage, and more importantly, our society’s continued shrug of the shoulders over both divorce and single-parenting. We adults yawn when it comes to these issues. Children everywhere have a different response: they cry themselves to sleep.
When It Comes to Fatherhood, Men Need to Be Men
Men who divorce, men who marry other men in order to raise children, or who anonymously sell their sperm—all follow in Esau’s footsteps. Except it is not our own birthrights we are trading for a mere bowl of soup. It is our children’s. We do so callously, selling their greatest treasure—growing up with their biological parents, with an intact biological family—very cheaply.
This world does not need us men to selfishly take whatever we want, especially if the price is the welfare of our children. Men are supposed to do the opposite: men are meant to protect their children from unhappiness, loneliness, and other threats. Real men don’t victimize their own children for their own benefit. They protect, they shield, absorbing stress and hardship rather than deflecting it onto their children. Men stand in the breach.
When it comes to fatherhood, our culture needs men to be men. For some, that may mean relinquishing certain dreams or our own yearnings. More and more, our culture is dominated by men who are self-interested and cowardly. C.S. Lewis would tell us we are a generation of men without chests.
Pope Saint John Paul II informed us, “Original sin attempts, then, to abolish fatherhood, destroying its rays which permeate the created world, placing in doubt the truth about God who is Love” (emphasis his). During this current age, marriage, family, and even gender are undermined in every conceivable way, and fatherhood in particular is under relentless, violent attack. It is up to us men to courageously fight back.
Our children deserve better. They don’t need superheroes; just quiet, unsung, ordinary, everyday heroes who answer to the name “Daddy”—not spoken over a phone, but whispered into our ears as they safely and contentedly rest in our arms.
