“Euthanasia is a grave violation of the law of god, suicide it is the deliberate and morally unacceptable killing of a human person”
Circumstances like long illnesses actually help people to face death.
The pope opposes euthanasia because of the strongly taught commandment “Thou Shall Not Kill”. The pope regards the sanctity of life as an extremely important teaching and places the highest value on human life and suffering and pain do not stop life being valuable and is not a reason for ending life.
“You are Gods temple and his spirit lives in you”
Christians believe that God’s spirit lives in us all because he created us in his own image which links back with the sanctity of life and life being sacred, also because his spirit lives in humans, some believe that if we destroy God’s temple, then we will all be destroyed because it is holy, therefore this teaching opposes euthanasia.
A church that presents a none absolute view on euthanasia are the Quakers. They do not have a definite view. Most Quakers however do not support euthanasia
“It would not be easy deciding to switch off a life support machine; most Quakers would probably feel this might be the right thing to do”
Some Quakers however oppose euthanasia because they say that because of their peace testimony they do not see violence or the taking of life as a problem solving methods because euthanasia is the taking of life and it goes against their peace testimony so they see this as wrong. Other Quakers would say that if people for each other, offer proper support and pain relief, euthanasia should not be needed therefore this could be used against euthanasia because euthanasia is not there give pain control but to end a life therefore ending pain completely. Some Quakers work in the hospice movements, which seeks to care for patients so that the quality of life is maintained as death approaches. Some Quakers hold “clearness meetings to prepare themselves and making decisions about how they wish to be treated, when they know that their death is likely.
Some Christians who disagree with euthanasia but support the idea of dying with dignity have been involved with the setting up of the hospice movement. A hospice is a place people with terminal illnesses are treated until they die. The hospices focus in pain control and the aim of the hospice movement is to give people with painful terminal diseases the best possible quality of life for the remainder of their life.
However some Christians do not oppose euthanasia, a teaching that could be used to support euthanasia are situation ethics. Situation ethics evolves from the Christian teaching of Agape. Agape is Christian love, situation ethics focuses on the most loving thing to do in a situation. Some Christians feel that it is better for someone to die in a painless death in dignity than go on suffering in pain from a terminal illness. Therefore situation ethics can be used to support euthanasia.
Christians except the view that there is a time to die, they may instead bring up the teaching of “Free Will” that supports euthanasia.
Free will is for some Christians, it is very important because it is one of the things that make us unique from animals, the ability to make our own choices and decision about our own lives
Therefore these Christians believe that we have the right to use free will whenever we want even for perhaps the most important decision of our lives, whether we are going to go on living to end our lives.
Another teaching which supports this view is the teaching from genesis that God gave man domination over everything, from this Christians can see that they have a responsibility to use God’s gift to the full and some Christians may see euthanasia as the more loving thing to do to use another person’s suffering.
