Euthanasia: Mercy or Murder?

Nurses live with death every day. It becomes routine, but routine doesn't mean our hearts hurt any less when a patient passes, or that we feel any less joy when one heals. We get emotionally exhausted. We tire of suffering. Sometimes we wish it would end sooner. Sometimes we wish we could end it ourselves.

Euthanasia is intentionally ending a life by administering lethal medication. Animals are "put to sleep" at the vet to end needless suffering, and we call that humane. Society praises a peaceful end to an animal's suffering but condemns the same act for a human being. Those with a religious background often call it murder, and by legal definition murder is the intentional ending of life, sometimes with statutory weight added for malice aforethought, premeditation, or a death that occurs during another serious crime.

I once cared for a patient with end-stage cancer. He was under hospice care on a morphine drip, and he still suffered. His family suffered. For three weeks he fought for breath and struggled with pain the morphine couldn't reach. More than once I questioned the rightness of letting him suffer like that, and the immorality of bringing an inevitable end much sooner. Nurses are supposed to show mercy. My heart hurt.

But what about murder? If you hold to common law, intentionally ending a human life with malice aforethought and premeditation is murder. What if you argue that euthanasia carries no malice, only mercy? No person without legally vested authority gets to be judge, jury, and executioner over another. For those who practice religion, only God holds the authority to take a human life, and in specific cases He vests that authority in governments. In the Christian tradition, God permits suffering and uses it for His purposes, and mere mortals are in no position to question Him.

We take an oath to do no harm. We're also called to be merciful and compassionate. So is the euthanasia of a dying person an act of unspeakable harm, or unspeakable mercy?