Category: COVID-19 and Medical Aid in Dying in Canada

This World is Not my Home….

Back in the day, mellow voiced singer Jim Reeves popularized the Southern Gospel song, This World is Not my Home….

This world is not my home, I’m just a passing through,

My treasures are laid up, Somewhere beyond blue.

The Angels beckon me, From heaven’s open door

And, I can’t be at home in this world anymore.

Living with the constancy of the fear of death which has been associated with the media message on the epic proportions of the death dealing pandemic, we have forgotten that it is important to live for today, knowing that we are ‘…just passing through.’

Life has never laid claim to being eternal here in our earthly existence. We are all going to die, so trying to cling to this life, to avoid the vagaries of the threat of death, shifts and changes how we live our lives.

Living in fear and panic of a deadly threat has stressed out so many people that it is threatening to break apart families, friendships, neighborhoods and communities, based on whether one is vaccinated or not. If in fact we are called to show love to our enemies, how can we in good conscience tolerate the intolerance of rejecting someone we care for because they disagree with our position/stance?

It seems to me that ‘Love’ would act differently. It would embrace and care for, despite the varying beliefs around ‘…to be, or not to be…’ vaccinated.

Here are a couple of articles, albeit one from 4 months ago, that look at this from a different perspective.

National Post: ‘Unjustified fears’: When COVID-19 anxiety stops making sense.

“Polls keep showing that the public believes COVID-19 disease is way deadlier and more pervasive than it really is“

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/unjustified-fears-when-covid-19-anxiety-stops-making-sense

And, CTV did an excellent piece on reasons individuals are choosing to hold back from getting the current vaccines, which is more recent.

‘We are not anti-vaxxers’: Concerns over side-effects, research among main reasons some Canadians are not getting COVID-19 vaccine

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/we-are-not-anti-vaxxers-concerns-over-side-effects-research-among-main-reasons-some-canadians-are-not-getting-covid-19-vaccine-1.5545896

Being at odds with each other is causing more damage and harm in personal relationships than all the lockdowns/masking and other restrictions put together.

It’s time to re-examine our priorities and decide if we can afford the divisiveness that is being foisted off on us by media, government and health professionals. Our social fabric is being rent asunder all ready with the imposition of ongoing restrictions, can we really afford to show further intolerance because another does not agree with us on this single issue? Why such intolerance when we have had so much rhetoric in recent years on inclusion, acceptance, and diversity?

I really believe that ‘Love’ would act differently — and work to bring us together, not pull and push us so far apart.


Devotional Reflections…Rest, Stop Striving…

The Lord says to me, and perhaps to you, to stop taking on so much in my own strength, but, rather, to only take on His yoke and His burden, which He promises will be light…

Be at peace – and take your rest. Dwell securely in My Presence and be assured of My LOVE. I do not ask monumental feats of you or demand things too far beyond your capacity and capability to do. I am not asking you to always be striving, without let up, to become more perfected in your own sight. I love and accept you as the ‘real’ you and do not ask that you be more than you are or to achieve beyond your ability to do what I have already gifted and equipped you to do. You, yourself, are your own hardest taskmaster and greatest critic, always striving to do more and be better.  But I only ask you to be who I have made you to be, and to do only what I have designed you to do.

As you come to Me, to ‘rest’ in My LOVE and take only My Yoke upon you, truly, you will find that it is easy to bear, and is exceedingly light, because I have designed it and it is directly proportioned for you, personally, to bear. My yoke neither chafes nor oppresses. Rather, it is a joy to bear it, because it fits so well, since it is personally designed specifically for you.

When you take on what you, or others, ask or expect of you, the weight of the yoke becomes oppressive, and you are unable to bear up under it. When that oppressive weight upon your shoulders leads you to be overburdened, you must know that it is not from ME. It is too heavy because you have added to it things that I have never asked you to assume, take responsibility for, or take on because you believe you can, or think you must.

Everything that you think to do may not necessarily be My will, My purpose, or My plan for you. It is easy to get guilt-tripped by the enemy of your soul to overburden and overextend yourself. Step back and say, ‘Lord, show me what is Your will in the matter.’ I will answer.

TRUST Me to LEAD you…ALWAYS.

Two Deaths…

“Grandma, it’s all right. You can go now“

My eldest Swedish Canadian cousin died at home on Christmas Day in 2018. Our families had grown up together in rural SK until she married at 18. The day after their wedding, she and her new husband, along with her entire family, moved to Vancouver Island, BC primarily to deal with her serious health issues, stemming from asthma.

The health challenges would plague her all her life.

She was 83 and her entire family kept vigil with her at her bedside through her final days and hours. She and her husband of 65 yrs. were residents of a senior’s supported living condo in Victoria, B.C.

After struggling with a myriad of health challenges for a prolonged period of years, she finally elected to stop any further treatments earlier in December and was referred to palliative care. Her personal physician continued to journey with her, including spending several hours with her at her home on December 24 – a testament to the quality of the person this patient was and what she meant to her primary healthcare provider.

Early on Christmas morning, waking in her own bed, surrounded by her nine daughters, granddaughters, and great granddaughters, she opened her eyes and asked for her husband. He was called into the bedroom from the adjacent living room, where he and his 6 sons-in-law and grandsons had been spread around the small space slumbering, as best they could.

The 65th Christmas

He leaned across the bed to his wife, and she looked up at him and said, “We’ve had 65 Christmases together.”

She lingered through the day, not fully aware of her surroundings or those with her. In mid-afternoon most of the family adjourned to the daughter’s home, a short way away, where the traditional turkey had been prepared, to share in festive turkey sandwiches.

When they returned, the two granddaughters who were nurses, who had remained behind, called the husband in to see her again. As they left the bedside, he climbed up on the bed beside her and took her into his arms.

He whispered to her, “Grandma, it’s all right. You can go now.”

Within seconds, her breathing stopped, and she quietly slipped into eternity.

A different kind of death

A friend in my Ladies Bible Study shared the experience of a friend of hers who had journeyed with a lady who chose Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD), within about the same time frame as the death of my cousin. Medical Aid in Dying is the term utilized by the Government of Canada in its legislation to avoid use of the terms ‘physician assisted suicide’ and euthanasia. [Any doctor today would tell you that every licensed doctor has been providing ‘medical aid in dying’ since time immemorial.]

The person in question was invited by friend of hers who was terminally ill to be present during the procedure to medically end her life. While the first person was very reluctant to participate because she did not support, nor believe in, the use of physician assisted suicide, because she valued the friendship, and the trust placed in her to be asked to journey with her friend through this end of life experience, she reluctantly agreed to be present for the medical procedure that would terminate the life of her friend.  

The night before the medical appointment to end her life by lethal injection, i.e. proceed with the ‘medical aid in dying’ procedure, the lady who was terminally ill held a family dinner that had the whole family gathered as if in celebration of a very festive occasion. There was great food, good company, laughter, dancing and singing. The patient herself presided at the piano and led the company of children, grandchildren, and close friends in a sing-along into the wee hours of the morning.

Everyone said their good nights and goodbyes as if they were just completing a stellar social occasion.

The next morning, the friend returned to be with the patient who had her appointment with death. She reported that the woman had dressed to the hilt in her best dress outfit, complete with her usual string of pearls.

The patient laid down on her bed in her bedroom, then paused, and asked the Chaplain who was present to say a prayer. She then extended her arm to the medical practitioner in the room, said, “Let’s get this done,” and received the fatal, lethal injections in her extended arm.

The friend of the patient who was a witness to the whole procedure, from the social gathering to her friend taking her last breath, was traumatized. She commented later that, it was “…like putting a dog down.” She vowed she would never participate in a physician-assisted-suicide again and, to this day, still has nightmares around witnessing the procedure.

The Difference

I have shared these scenarios with care workers training for visiting in institutions. They immediately “get” the difference between these two deaths. Do you?

Government Dependence…a coming Holocaust?

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is building-architecture-historical-tower.jpg

In a few weeks under the COVID-19 crisis, governments have changed Canada and the United States in ways that socialism has been trying to do for over 150 years.

One of my major concerns is that we have, within a few short weeks, become more government dependent as a nation than at any other time in the history of our democracy. We could never have ever imagined something like this happening so fast. Almost every sector of our economy has become dependent on government financial aid, including individuals who have opted to give up paid jobs because they can receive more on government aid than by working.

What has been advocated to be introduced, and implemented, since the advent of socialism 150-200 yrs ago, has in the course of a few short weeks, become ‘common’ in both Canada and the US. I believe this will not bode well for coming out of this pandemic crisis and the economic recovery. We have mortgaged, not only the future of our grandchildren to the hilt with the massive debt load, but I think it will prove to have been a ‘mortgaging’ of our very souls, as well.

The demand for limited resources to be stretched to provide guaranteed income support for all Canadians will have a deleterious impact on our Canadian economy and the ability for government to finance it, and recover, and deal with massive, overwhelming debt.

Saving Health Care Resources by Moving MAiD from Voluntary to Mandatory

The expectation on the part of the many to maintain the dependence on government support will require excessive draws on limited government financial resources. [And, I foresee that resulting in the decision for cuts to healthcare that will make it expedient to move Medical Aid in Dying — Doctor assisted suicide — from the realm of being voluntary to being mandatory.]

The inability for government to meet all the demands for ongoing financial support could well end in social chaos and violence, with everyone demanding the same level of access to all resources, even if it means wresting them out of my neighbors hands with force.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is birkenau-auschwitz-concentration-camp-53442.jpeg

This “Unprecedented Time” – Not Unprecedented

History has shown that this is typical of such a scenario…think Nazi Germany in the 1930’s….the economic conditions, prepared the German people to accept government control and social engineering at an unprecedented level, in ways that afterwards left people shaking their heads, saying, “How could this have happened in such a civilized, educated, sophisticated society?”  [Remember, that the killing that eventually moved into the holocaust, and the loss of 6 million lives, began with euthanizing the most vulnerable, the ‘undesirables’ — those who were not productive to the economy, but rather a drain on limited, depression economy resources.

Biblical Quotes and Inspirational Thoughts to Put Steel in Our Souls

That being said, here are some scriptures, and comments, that I think are relevant for us today as we negotiate this unprecedented time and the challenges to our individual and personal spiritual walks. I believe these speak to how we must live our personal lives given these current times, and in order to be ready for what lies ahead.

From Revelation 3, quoted in the Catholic Office of Readings recently, to two of the churches:

To the church of Philadelphia: Rev. 3: 8, 10-11, 12a
“‘I know your deeds; that is why I have left an open door which no one can close. I know that your strength is limited; yet you have held fast to my word and have not denied my name….Because you have kept my plea to stand fast, I will keep you safe in the time of trial which is coming on the whole world, to test all men on earth. I am coming soon. Hold fast to what you have lest someone rob you of your crown.

‘I will make the victor a pillar in the temple of my God and he shall never leave it.'”

To the church of Laodicea: Rev. 3: 15-16, 17,19, 20-21a

“‘I know your deeds; I know you are neither hot nor cold….But, because  you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I will spew you out of my mouth|! You keep saying, “I am rich and secure and want for nothing.” Little do you realize how wretched you are, how pitiable and poor, how blind and naked….
“‘Whoever is dear to me I reprove and chastise.. Be earnest about it, therefor. Repent.
“‘Here I stand, knocking at the door. If anyone hears me calling and opens the door, I will enter his house and have supper with him, and he with me. I will give the victor the right to sit with me on my throne…..'”

And, from Oswald Chambers, known best as the author of “My Utmost for His Highest”, writing in “Devotions for a Deeper Life”:

“If you think that your obedience, your repentance, or your morality is going to get you nearer to Jesus Christ, you are making a mistake. Intimacy with Christ comes only by abandoning yourself to Him.
“Your crying out to God will not save you. Surrendering your possessions will not save you. You may give God everything you like and still be damned. God never asked you to give him anything but your will.
“The only barrier to your salvation is yourself….Yet all depends on whether you submit  your will to Him.
“Some people are more concerned about being in earnest than about being in God’s will.”

And, finally, from “A Daily Catholic Moment: 10 Minutes Alone with God”:

Rom.12:2 – Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. (ESV)

“The key to living in the here and now is awareness of what we are doing and acceptance of what is going on beyond the surface appearances. This daily discipline is difficult and takes practice. It requires that we be sensitive to what we are experiencing, accept the person before us without judgment, savor and enjoy what surrounds us, and deal with interruptions and change of plans with grace and peace. When we live fully in the here and now, we reverence the holiness of each action of our daily routine. Why? Because we are convinced that this moment is God’s ambassador that reveals the divine will for us in the here and now. Generously accepting the present moment, we can then gratefully bow to receive its blessings.”    Sr. Bridget Haase, OSU  

Devotional Thought (addended to her comments): Is there anything keeping me from living in the here and now, today?

May He keep us in peace, in the ‘here and now’ of our day, which, really, is preparation for whatever tomorrow brings to us.