The Illinois legislature is considering legislation that would allow a mentally capable, terminally ill adult with a prognosis of six months or less the option to obtain a prescription medication they may decide to take so they can die peacefully and end their suffering.
The bill is opposed by some religious groups as well as some advocates for people with disabilities who fear that this could be a slippery slope toward convincing, even forcing, individuals with severe disabilities to accept an early death against their wishes.
Both views should be respected. However, it’s time for a new debate on the philosophy and theology of dying.
Death is the ultimate goal of all life. I am 86 years old and increasingly — with ambivalent acceptance — recognize my coming demise. Indeed, one of the downsides of getting old is losing old friends to death. And, please don’t use the term “senior” in referring at least to me. I was a senior in 1957 and knew everything — now I’m just old and understand that I know very little.
Some of us are optimistic about what occurs after we die while others not so. Most of us are agnostic to one degree or another. When I was a young boy, the cardinal became gravely ill. The nuns asked us to pray for his recovery. Even at that youthful age, I thought it a bit ironic. After all, for the previous half-dozen years or so, the nuns had been teaching us, per the Baltimore Catechism, that we are here “to know love and serve God in this world to be happy with him in the next.” The cardinal had, I presumed, known, loved and served God, and therefore shouldn’t we be praying he die and move on to this ultimate reward?
I never thought much about dying until I became public guardian of Cook County. In that role, I began to visit elderly people suffering from dementia in nursing homes. Most were physically fine or almost. Others in nursing homes are not and may be kept alive with feeding and medical tubes. Or they’re tied to wheelchairs, their heads drooping over their chests. Some wander, glassy-eyed and mumbling. A few may be tied to their beds, with medication streaming into their bodies. Underpaid attendants try to provide a semblance of dignity.
In 1990, I argued and prevailed in a case before the Illinois Supreme Court, which held that it was legal to withdraw all nourishment from an individual who at that point had been in a persistent vegetative state for years and was being kept alive with a feeding tube. (When competent, he had made it quite clear that he would not want to live under these circumstances.)
And, about 30 years later, I became power of attorney for a dear friend from high school who ultimately was confined to his bed in a nursing home, kept alive by bags of medication assaulting his veins. I ordered all medication to stop. The doctors warned, “You know he’ll die?” Of course, I replied. That’s the point.
The philosophy and the theology of dying are anachronistic. They were formed at a time when people got old or sick or both and died. This was true for centuries including during the first part of my own life. Today, not only do machines and medication keep us alive longer, but healthier lifestyles also keep our blood pressure lower and our hearts healthier. Our bodies keep going, even though our minds are weak, our bodies fragile and our will to live extinct.
“Assisted suicide” is a loaded concept. If a competent person leaves explicit directions about how he or she wishes to die, instead of languishing toward a painful and certain death, that wish should be honored.
We are all going to die. Better to do so peacefully surrounded by friends and family, if possible, rather than confined like an animal to live out one’s days deprived of dignity and forced to endure humiliation and pain in order to assuage the moral edicts of medieval philosophy and theology.
Patrick Murphy is a Cook County Circuit Court judge. He was a Cook County public guardian for 26 years and worked with the Cook County state’s attorney’s office.
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What being Cook County public guardian taught me about death
