I'm grateful for Martha's thoughtful points here, especially how she invites us to also be in a liminal space of nuance and uncertainty. Being uncertain, or acknowledging that there are no perfect or easy choices in a situation like the Smiths' is too often (and to our detriment) seen as capitulating to the 'other side' (whichever that may be) when, really, it is simply wisdom.
Thanks Martha for encouraging us to pause and think about this situation. It is not at all clear cut to me from a moral perspective. I do think that treating our bodies for a strictly utilitarian end while ignoring the reality of "imago Dei" in us leads to evil. I feel very hesitant of organ harvesting for this reason especially after listening to the new debate about defining death as occurring much later than the term "brain death" implies, which some doctors are criticizing as having no empirical definition--the term having been invented to facilitate the organ harvesting business from live human bodies. (Organs must after all come from "living" bodies or else they are no good). I believe that a strong moral case can be made for allowing "natural" death to take it's course in some situations. Some extraordinary medical means seem to cause unnecessary pain and suffering and seem disrespectful of the body and are administered because the technology is there, not because it is good. I am not saying that Adrianna Smith was made to suffer unnecessarily or that her (still living) body has been disrespected through this process. I don't know enough. I do know that she is still living (and not a corpse) and her baby is still living, so at the very least, extreme caution, prayer and repentance is called for no matter what decision is made. For many reasons I side with the Orthodox guidance to treat the body always with respect and care all they way through what we perceive as death and decomposition. We do this as much for our own spiritual health as for the dead. The issue of "who decides" is also important here.
Hey Dad! Yeah, I agree that once you start actually thinking about organ donation, especially Ramsey's "card-carrying precadaver" part, it's hard to go back to un-thinking about it. I just decided that it was too much to get into in this post. And...if we are skeptical about organ donation, how can we use it as an excuse in this particular case? (I found that parallel of Fr Tad's especially jarring.) And I agree that we should treat Adriana as living. So much bad is done by assuming that someone unconscious is not "there."
Thank you for writing this and for doing so in such a thoughtful way. Like you, I thought Fr. Tad's parallel was particularly interesting. I think hypotheticals can be very helpful, although the ideologues try to avoid them for obvious reasons. For example, what if she had been 1 week pregnant? 2 weeks? 3 days? Or what if she had been 25 weeks pregnant? 26? 20? 37? I think these hypotheticals help illustrate how little of this is black and white.
It also resonated because of a tragedy we recently experienced, where a 5-year-old boy died in a car accident. He was kept alive for almost a week so that his family (some of whom had been seriously injured in the accident) could say goodbye before his organs were donated. Even that period of time made me a bit uneasy and was, frankly, confusing to my kids as we tried to explain that he was dead, but not really dead. I think it is important to recognize that many of us are uncomfortable with how medical technology treats death.
Lastly, I am a lawyer and once had a client call me to advise on the legal implications of ending a pregnancy in a similarly difficult circumstance (very different facts though). I felt so awkward to be brought into such an intimate situation where it was very clear that the doctor, mother, and family were thinking deeply about the situation and were in agony over what to do. My main takeaway was that I did not belong there and somewhat resented having to provide cold, legal analysis amidst such personal tragedy.
We 'normal people' (not academics, not ethicists) assume we don't need to worry about medical/bioethics...until suddenly we do. I hope to get people thinking about what they actually believe in, and to be more prepared to face these really hard situations because sooner or later something will come for us. Hopefully nothing this hard, but it happens more than we like to think.
Thank you for such a clear and understandable explanation of a Christian bioethic here. Allowing a pregnant woman to die (tragically!) of natural causes is so far removed from abortion that it’s so sad we would think of it that way. Just because modern medicine can make some crazy things possible certainly doesn’t mean we ought to use it, and even more certainly doesn’t mean someone is morally culpable for choosing not to utilize it. I hope this heartbreaking situation give people opportunity to rethink their fertility ethics — having flesh and blood involved, I think, forces us to reckon with the humanity that is always present in it, even if hidden within Petri dishes or cryo storage.
It's near to my heart. I saw it so, so, SO many times in oncology! But even something like long-term hemodialysis seems to be casually undertaken with little discussion around whether one really wants to sign up for it. It's life-sustaining treatment! But I saw so many people never being given moral permission to let their dying bodies die without significant medical intervention.
So, I really hope your essay gets published, because I'm sure you'll say something really good about it!
Babies communicate with their moms continuously during pregnancy. I cannot imagine the horrific loneliness of this baby as it grows in an effective sensory deprivation chamber.
It is a profoundly evil and morally abhorrent experiment and the fact that people who consider themselves “Christians” could ever defend it really makes me despair.
It’s entirely possible that you’re right, but suffering isn’t a reason to end a life, which is why we have to look at the bigger picture of what is going on with his mom and what it means to remove life support.
I'm grateful for Martha's thoughtful points here, especially how she invites us to also be in a liminal space of nuance and uncertainty. Being uncertain, or acknowledging that there are no perfect or easy choices in a situation like the Smiths' is too often (and to our detriment) seen as capitulating to the 'other side' (whichever that may be) when, really, it is simply wisdom.
Thanks Martha for encouraging us to pause and think about this situation. It is not at all clear cut to me from a moral perspective. I do think that treating our bodies for a strictly utilitarian end while ignoring the reality of "imago Dei" in us leads to evil. I feel very hesitant of organ harvesting for this reason especially after listening to the new debate about defining death as occurring much later than the term "brain death" implies, which some doctors are criticizing as having no empirical definition--the term having been invented to facilitate the organ harvesting business from live human bodies. (Organs must after all come from "living" bodies or else they are no good). I believe that a strong moral case can be made for allowing "natural" death to take it's course in some situations. Some extraordinary medical means seem to cause unnecessary pain and suffering and seem disrespectful of the body and are administered because the technology is there, not because it is good. I am not saying that Adrianna Smith was made to suffer unnecessarily or that her (still living) body has been disrespected through this process. I don't know enough. I do know that she is still living (and not a corpse) and her baby is still living, so at the very least, extreme caution, prayer and repentance is called for no matter what decision is made. For many reasons I side with the Orthodox guidance to treat the body always with respect and care all they way through what we perceive as death and decomposition. We do this as much for our own spiritual health as for the dead. The issue of "who decides" is also important here.
Hey Dad! Yeah, I agree that once you start actually thinking about organ donation, especially Ramsey's "card-carrying precadaver" part, it's hard to go back to un-thinking about it. I just decided that it was too much to get into in this post. And...if we are skeptical about organ donation, how can we use it as an excuse in this particular case? (I found that parallel of Fr Tad's especially jarring.) And I agree that we should treat Adriana as living. So much bad is done by assuming that someone unconscious is not "there."
Thank you for writing this and for doing so in such a thoughtful way. Like you, I thought Fr. Tad's parallel was particularly interesting. I think hypotheticals can be very helpful, although the ideologues try to avoid them for obvious reasons. For example, what if she had been 1 week pregnant? 2 weeks? 3 days? Or what if she had been 25 weeks pregnant? 26? 20? 37? I think these hypotheticals help illustrate how little of this is black and white.
It also resonated because of a tragedy we recently experienced, where a 5-year-old boy died in a car accident. He was kept alive for almost a week so that his family (some of whom had been seriously injured in the accident) could say goodbye before his organs were donated. Even that period of time made me a bit uneasy and was, frankly, confusing to my kids as we tried to explain that he was dead, but not really dead. I think it is important to recognize that many of us are uncomfortable with how medical technology treats death.
Lastly, I am a lawyer and once had a client call me to advise on the legal implications of ending a pregnancy in a similarly difficult circumstance (very different facts though). I felt so awkward to be brought into such an intimate situation where it was very clear that the doctor, mother, and family were thinking deeply about the situation and were in agony over what to do. My main takeaway was that I did not belong there and somewhat resented having to provide cold, legal analysis amidst such personal tragedy.
We 'normal people' (not academics, not ethicists) assume we don't need to worry about medical/bioethics...until suddenly we do. I hope to get people thinking about what they actually believe in, and to be more prepared to face these really hard situations because sooner or later something will come for us. Hopefully nothing this hard, but it happens more than we like to think.
Thank you for such a clear and understandable explanation of a Christian bioethic here. Allowing a pregnant woman to die (tragically!) of natural causes is so far removed from abortion that it’s so sad we would think of it that way. Just because modern medicine can make some crazy things possible certainly doesn’t mean we ought to use it, and even more certainly doesn’t mean someone is morally culpable for choosing not to utilize it. I hope this heartbreaking situation give people opportunity to rethink their fertility ethics — having flesh and blood involved, I think, forces us to reckon with the humanity that is always present in it, even if hidden within Petri dishes or cryo storage.
This was well-written and so thoughtful.
Feeling (or being perceived as) "morally culpable for choosing not to utilize it"
<---- This, I think, gets at the heart of more than a couple issues related to the world of medicine and healthcare, having the technology we do.
It's near to my heart. I saw it so, so, SO many times in oncology! But even something like long-term hemodialysis seems to be casually undertaken with little discussion around whether one really wants to sign up for it. It's life-sustaining treatment! But I saw so many people never being given moral permission to let their dying bodies die without significant medical intervention.
So, I really hope your essay gets published, because I'm sure you'll say something really good about it!
Babies communicate with their moms continuously during pregnancy. I cannot imagine the horrific loneliness of this baby as it grows in an effective sensory deprivation chamber.
It is a profoundly evil and morally abhorrent experiment and the fact that people who consider themselves “Christians” could ever defend it really makes me despair.
It’s entirely possible that you’re right, but suffering isn’t a reason to end a life, which is why we have to look at the bigger picture of what is going on with his mom and what it means to remove life support.
GOD chose to end baby’s life when mom died. Baby was 9 weeks old.
The choice to begin life support in the first place was manifestly and self-evidently an evil choice. Death, when God wills it, is not to be feared.