Love makes suffering bearable

Colin Harte, director of the U.K. anti-euthanasia group ALERT, addressed the question of suffering head-on at the 2nd International Symposium on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. "Once suicide is considered a legitimate option . . . words of hope lose their power - because death itself is seen as a means of liberation, the means of satisfaction. Death is regarded as the source of hope." If assisted suicide is legal, it makes the caregiver's job nearly impossible. "I would [be] regarded as being cruel . . . to encourage [a hopeless, suffering person] to live. Once you have a law allowing the so-called 'compassionate choice' to die, if you want to emphasize another option which is going to involve suffering, you are suddenly becoming the person who is not compassionate, who is inflicting suffering. We live in a ... world today where those who give up the fight are called tenacious, and those who abandon their use of free will by killing themselves somehow achieve an independence. It's madness!" said Harte. "We should be able to say plainly: it's mad. It's absurd." LifeSiteNews