Celebrating Life all the Way to the End

Notes for Lutherans for Life, Houston, Texas (Feb 24, 2024)

QUOTATIONS:

Albert Camus summarizes nihilism ” there is about one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.”
“Making Sense of Your World: A Biblical Worldview”, Gary Phillips, William Brown, Johnstone Street, (Salem: Sheffield, 2nd ed, 2008), 30.

“They threaten us with death. If they were as wise as they are foolish, they would threaten us with life. … It is a ridiculous, laughable threat to frighten Christ and His Christians with death when they are lords and victors over death.”
Martin Luther, from a letter in 1522, quoted in “The Joy of Eternal Life”, Philip Nicolai (St Louis: CPH, 2021), 101

“During the centuries of Christian domination of European thought, the ethical attitudes [toward killing] based on these doctrines [i.e. human exceptionalism and immortality] became part of the unquestioned moral orthodoxy of European civilization. Today the doctrines are no longer generally accepted, but the ethical attitudes to which they gave rise fit in with the deep-seated Western belief in the uniqueness and special privileges of our species, and have survived.”
“Writings on an Ethical Life”, Peter Singer (New York: Ecco, 2000), 129-130. Quoted in “The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self” Carl Truman (Wheaton: Crossway, 2020), 316 n. 13.

It is also important to note that Christianity stands almost alone in its condemnation of suicide. Even the ancient Stoics, who were common allies against the Epicureans, allowed the taking of one’s own life. The foundation of the Christian prohibition against suicide is twofold. First, it is a kind of murder the murder of oneself. Second, it is an act of despair, which is a mortal sin contrary to the theological virtue of hope. Over and above these things, the centrality of Christ’s passion made the bearing of severe suffering the very model of redemption. Christians were commanded to take up their cross and, as Christ did, bear their suffering to the bitter end, for bearing such suffering in imitation of Christ was taken to be the path to holiness and eternal life.
Moral Darwinism, Benjamin Wiker, page 90

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