AMERICA/CHILE - “Cold proposals of euthanasia cannot alleviate the suffering of the sick and their families, they merely indicate of a total lack of understanding and knowledge of the human person” says secretary of the Bishops’ Conference

Tuesday, 16 May 2006

Santiago (Fides Service) - “Can death wilfully caused for example by a lethal injection be a 'happy death'? Is not natural death, with the use of scientific means to alleviate bodily pain and at the same time all the means of love to mitigate the pain of the soul, more worthy?” asks Bishop Cristián Contreras Villarroel, auxiliary of Santiago de Chile secretary general of the Chilean Bishops’ Conference with regard to proposals to legalise euthanasia, in a comment with the title "Euthanasia, a worthy death ?”. Bishop Contreras notes that "in many countries various movements are discovering that compassionate accompanying of the sick the best way to help people die a truly worthy death".
Referring to his own experience of family pastoral the Bishop says that despite the great suffering of the terminally ill “the majority of them live this stage without desperation, strengthened by the consoling presence of their loved ones and the spiritual accompaniment of the Church”. However there are cases in which pain becomes unbearable “rendered more acute with other sorts of pain, deep suffering in the soul, caused by solitude and lack of hope”. Precisely in these situations many think "life has lost its meaning and therefore its value" and are induced to believe "that the way to death with dignity is to hasten it avoiding any sort of suffering".
In this reality the Bishop mentions the work of numerous groups of volunteers "who keep the dying company, suffering with them, "valuing" the life of the person not for his or her social utility but as a gift to give in self giving for others ". "This will always be valid, although it implicates the difficulty of accepting pain rather than avoiding it, and calls for the great sacrifice of sharing suffering".
" Cold proposals of euthanasia cannot alleviate the suffering of the sick and their families.- says Bishop Cristián -. They merely indicate of a total lack of understanding and knowledge of the human person". However it is necessary to realise, the comment of the secretary of the Bishops’ Conference continues, that resistance to euthanasia must never be seen as "legitimising those unjust means which claim to prolong life at any human or economic price".
“Medical progress offers wonderful opportunities to alleviate human suffering but at the same time proposes ethical challenges concerning the most profound role of a society: caring for one another in health and in sickness” the Bishop concluded. (RG) (Agenzia Fides 16/5/2006; righe 32, parole 438)


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