Choosing Life in a Culture of Death

There are people in your position: Choosing life in a culture of death

“The most beautiful credo is the one we pronounce in our hour of darkness.”-St. Padre Pio


The day before John Michael’s valveoplasty procedure, Jen and I met with the cardiologist who would be overseeing the operation. He explained how the surgeons planned to run a balloon through John John’s three day-old heart, his mitral valve specifically, in the hope of opening it up and allowing oxygen to flow freely. The hole that also existed in our son’s heart could wait until later to be dealt with, but not the valve. The doctor told us that without this procedure our son would slowly but surely die, maybe a month, maybe a year. Then he said something we were unprepared for; “There are people in your position who would elect not to go through with this procedure.” I want to believe he was saying this because we live in a society that sues doctors. I want to believe he was thinking about informed consent, that parents must be apprised of all their options before making a life or death decision about their child. He must have noticed the shock in our faces, because he quickly added, “I know what your answer is going to be, but I needed to say that.” Our response was brief, “Save our baby.”
I’ve had 15 years to reflect on that exchange, 15 years to think of all the parents who hear similar words from doctors and in their fear see a quick out, 15 years to think about all the doctors who can’t or won’t uphold the first rule of the Hippocratic oath, “Do no harm.” And I have had 15 years to consider the society we live in…where the sanctity of life is slowly being eclipsed by a culture of death.
All of human life is sacred. There is no statistical table to help one compute whose life is valuable and whose is not in Christendom. Maybe one could find such a thing in the health insurance industry, but not within the bounds of an authentically Christian worldview. There is no need. Our Creator has spoken very clearly about this. Health, age, nationality, socio-economic status, race, religion, education, and I.Q. are not even considered factors in God’s eyes in determining sacredness. The imprint of the Image of God on our eternal souls (Genesis 1:27) and the love and delight He has for his children are what bestow us with dignity and value beyond calculation. “Truly, you have formed my inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb. I give you thanks, O God, that I am fearfully and wonderfully made; wonderful are your works. My soul also knew you full well” (Psalm 139: 13-14). And if God’s loving us and relating to us before we were even born is not enough to demonstrate our intrinsic worth, His Son’s willingness to live among us, and die for us, adds the final exclamation point to this issue. God didn’t make a mistake with John Michael, a mistake that needed to be corrected or erased by science. He doesn’t make mistakes with any babies. He knows exactly what He is doing, always. Carl Sandburg once wrote, “A baby is God’s opinion that the world should go on.” Babies represent new beginnings, and holy innocence, and precious hope; I shudder to think of a world void of these elements. We desperately need to be reminded by babies, especially babies like John Michael, that the sacred is not skin deep.
There have always been those who preferred death to life; defiled the sacred and attacked the Good. But the 20th century, on a scale never before seen, overwhelmed our collective senses with its unique combination of unrelenting violence and technological brilliance. This was the century that gave us Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, the atomic bomb and biological warfare. It is the century that introduced the word terrorism into our everyday vocabulary, and gave us legalized abortion and euthanasia. And it is the century that invented the radio and the telephone, television and the Internet. It has provided us with enough unfiltered information and visual images to last us ten lifetimes. In an effort to survive this assault on the human psyche, I think many have chosen to numb themselves to core issues of life and death…but at such a cost. We live in a global community that, paradoxically, has never been farther apart. Data is too often confused with wisdom, and contact with intimacy. So much upheaval, and change, and innovation, but have we really progressed all that far? Einstein put it this way: “We have perfected the means, but confused the ends.” The ultimate end is to love God, neighbor, and self more and more completely…and as a human race, I am doubtful that we are moving in this direction. I believe that the exchange Jenni and I had with the cardiologist 15 years ago is even more likely to happen today.
Babies like John Michael are more expendable than ever before. Special needs children are simply not easy, and productive, and cost effective in immediately quantifiable ways…not in a culture that is being blanketed more and more by the shroud of death. Dozens of people have shared with us that they don’t think they would have, or could have, given the cardiologist the go-ahead to perform the valveoplasty. They would have let their child die. Almost always, their reasons revolve around their own fears about being strong enough to rear a special needs child. The mistake made by people who could not see themselves rising to the occasion, or more accurately accepting the gift God gives them, is that they are not factoring grace into the equation. They are only seeing how far their will power can take them in a world that can be quite overwhelming in the amount of pain and unhappiness it dishes out. People who live outside of God’s grace, try to go it alone, should be afraid. They’re going to get pummeled.
Even with grace, life is difficult! There are days where I am beyond fatigued, and very unsure that I have what it takes to be an adequate father for any of my children, not just for John Michael. Parenting is a very humbling endeavor. I am tempted to run off and hide somewhere, to chuck my responsibilities, to let others take over. I have heard many excellent parents admit similar moments of weakness. This is residue of our creatureliness, our falleness, our brokenness, but not cause for despair. St. Augustine saw these moments where our true poverty breaks through as blessed because of what they clarify for us about our nature, and God’s. “Felix culpa”, the “blessed fault” that is original sin, is blessed because it reminds us that we cannot live life on our own terms and be successful in a meaningful way…and we’re not supposed to. Living in grace, and not fear, begins with an honest admission of need. “Lord, help me, hear my cry, save me from death in all its forms…”
There are people who choose death over life every day…with babies, with work, with alcohol and drugs, with violence; sometimes they are conscious of what they are choosing, sometimes they are not. “This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him” (Deuteronomy 30:19-20).
We’ve never needed special needs babies, special needs children, and special needs adults more…they are our wake-up calls, and our consciences, reminding us of what life and blessings really look like.