If Canadians hadn’t been sidetracked by the shenanigans of senators and the mayor of Toronto we might have been having a long – overdue debate on euthanasia—and maybe another on creating rules around medical engineering and building the bionic human.
Both issues are newsy enough to have been cover stories in recent issues of Maclean’s magazine. And both are profoundly related to our faith, especially the incarnation of God in Jesus that we celebrate at Christmas.
Each time these challenging medical – ethics issues are raised in the media, two things strike me. The first is how religion is often blamed for stifling debate and change—yet there is practically no discussion in the Christian community about these issues. Secondly, among those who do invoke religion to oppose liberalizing laws, they almost always declare that humans “shouldn’t play God” in these matters.
Regarding the first point, I’m not suggesting religion isn’t a factor in political lobbying. Roman Catholics and conservative evangelicals lobby politicians and tell their members what they deem is right and wrong.
But stating dogma shouldn’t be confused with healthy debate.
As for playing God, that is or at least should be at the heart of these debates for Christians.
In Genesis, God gives humanity the responsibility for caring for creation: We are essentially called to act on God’s behalf in everything we do that affects life (including its conclusion in death).
In the incarnation, God enters fully into the human experience, from gestation to death. Through that mystery, as members of the body of Christ, we are called to participate in Christ’s work of returning all of creation to its source.
Playing God is simply taking our baptismal vows seriously and acknowledging that God’s grace is present everywhere in creation and in every issue that affects human life.
The development of medical care itself is just such an example. If we didn’t want to play God, we should never have developed medicine. Then we could make God responsible for every death.
But surely our faith is more sophisticated than the feeble theology that concludes that when someone dies prematurely it is because “God wanted to take them home.” By that logic, my parents should have let God take me many years ago when I first had pneumonia as a child by not making sure I got antibiotics. I’m glad I got the drugs.
So we are right to act responsibly in extending attempts to help and heal people. But that responsibility surely extends to the extremes: at the beginning of life and at its end.
I am not suggesting that we need to impose our values on the country. But we can hardly contribute to these debates in a helpful manner if we haven’t done the hard work of thinking through our positions.
Our minds are a precious divine gift and these are challenging issues with many perspectives and facts to be weighed. Christmas is when we celebrate God’s most precious gift of love to us in Jesus.
May that love inspire us in all we do and think. And may you and your family experience that love richly this Christmas and be showered with blessings in the new year.
