Societies like ours don't jump off ethical cliffs in a single leap. They drift toward them in the name of lofty sounding ideals like autonomy and empathy.
Illinois Senate Bill 1950 is a tragic example of this.
The bill allows doctors to prescribe lethal drugs to patients deemed "terminal" within six months. Supporters oxymoronically call it "aid in dying."
On paper, of course, the bill includes guardrails: witness requirements, assurances that no doctor will be forced to participate, etc. But the history of assisted suicide laws - domestically in places like Oregon and Washington, or internationally in places like Canada and Belgium - demonstrates how unreliable those guardrails end up being. First they bend, then loosen, then erode. And once society accepts the idea that some lives are no longer worth living (a concept reinforced by abortion, infanticide, and the designer baby fetish), the logic inevitably pushes the boundaries outward.
It may begin with terminal illness, but it will always end somewhere very different.
Take Canada, where "medical assistance in dying" has moved from rare, tightly controlled exceptions to an expanding system now available to people with disabilities, chronic illness, and before long mental health struggles. Death, once peddled as narrowly defined mercy, has become in practice a broad solution for human suffering. The slope is never hypothetical or theoretical.
From 2023:
Unsurprisingly, faith leaders in Illinois are sounding the alarm. Noting the symbolism of the Illinois Senate passing the bill on Halloween, Bishop Thomas Paprocki cut through the euphemistic veneer:
Killing oneself is not dying with dignity. Doctors take an oath to do no harm. Now, they can prescribe death.
If a doctor can prescribe death, what stops a state or an insurance company from encouraging it? What stops a patient already haunted by fear, pain, depression, or financial pressure, from feeling obligated to take what is presented as the "responsible" option? For a society awash in a mental health crisis, this is a loaded invitation.
It's why the best way to describe assisted suicide is not "societal compassion," but rather "societal abandonment." Offering a suffering person a lethal prescription is the opposite of offering hope, healing, or care. It is shrugging our collective shoulders and whispering, "This is probably easier for everyone."
Of course, from the strictly utilitarian view of human life that a godless mind develops, that's the logical outworking. To the contemporary mind, compassion means removing suffering by any means necessary, even if that means removing the sufferer.
Christians know better. We understand that human life is sacred not because of what it can do, but because of what it is — a being that reflects the image of God. That distinction doesn't disappear just because someone is sick, discouraged, dying, or afraid. In fact, Scripture teaches that the weakest and most vulnerable among us are the ones who deserve our most attentive mercy, entering into suffering with presence, dignity, and care. There is honor in caring for the weak, and there should be shame in attempting to normalize their despair.
A society that embraces death as a solution will always find more and more reasons to use it.
A society that believes life is sacred will always look for ways to protect it.
Those two visions cannot and will not coexist indefinitely.
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Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Not the Bee or any of its affiliates.
