After 2 years of deliberation, the Vatican answered the question posed by the American bishops on behalf of the American Catholic Church. The question,
"When nutrition and hydration are being supplied by artificial means to a patient in a 'permanent vegetative state,' may they be discontinued when competent physicians judge with moral certainty that the patient will never recover consciousness?"
The answer was simply "no." The Vatican further stipulated that " a patient in a 'permanent vegetative state' is a person with fundamental human dignity and must, therefore, receive ordinary and proportionate care which includes, in principle, the administration of water and food even by artificial means."
The Vatican clearly expresses a deontological perspective. According to the Vatican's answer human dignity encompasses being provided—or forced—nourishment to keep his or her body alive, irrespective of a patient's expressed wishes regarding a permanently vegetative state, or factoring his or her personal sense of human dignity.
The Vatican is wrong to ignore people's wishes. We go through life exercising free will. As American's we're given this right as it follows with the right to exercise independent free will. Today's Americans may choose to die with varying measures of dignity. The Church would argue that the right is not ours; that God gives us life and therefore is the only one who may remove it justly.
The long-awaited decision handed down by the Vatican is little more than an extension to its already established beliefs. Particularly, the belief of the Church that suicide is a sin. However, no one has yet to be charged in this country. The necessity of the separation of church and state is especially evident in these issues.
No comments:
Post a Comment