Hopes and fears for the year

Standing on the cold threshold of a new year, Graeme Holdsworth recalls past audacity and whether his aspirations are too timid.

Graeme Holdsworth

Graeme is a vicar of Marsden and Slaithwaite in West Yorkshire. He also cycles and juggles.

A starry night sky below which a signpost is silhouetted.

Luca J on Unsplash.

Standing in the Vicarage garden, under the clear winter sky, I feel cold to my bones, as though Jack Frost has thrown his coat over my shoulders. I’ve been successfully shedding body-fat since early October when I began to cut out ‘added sugar’ foods from my diet, but it has come with a downside: I need some third-party insulation, preferably lightweight, breathable, wind, and waterproof. I love cycling under clear night skies, pausing away from towns and lights to let my eyes adjust sufficiently to see stars more in number than the sands of the sea, but my enthusiasm for winter riding is dampened by this bitter cold.

My first truly long-distance bike ride was an overnight cycle across the North Pennines, about 300km. A good friend had turned 40 and invited me to his party at a nightclub in Glasgow. I lived in Teesside at the time and thought it would be great fun to cycle there. I loaded my bicycle bags with party clothes, a change of shoes, and an appropriately expensive bottle of whisky as a gift, then set off into the early evening sunshine. By Bishop Auckland it was raining. Passing across Yad Moss to Alston at midnight, it was snowing.

I’m older now and experienced enough to know that there is a point where the discomfort of endurance tips over into the endurance of pain, but I still long for the adventure. Like Tolkien’s elderly Bilbo Baggins torn between the comfort of his hobbit hole, and his yearning to see mountains again: my mind returns to summer cycling and riding through the night in shorts and short sleeves. Bilbo’s first journey was one of inexperience and unpreparedness, but he faced his dragon and returned home with tales to tell. Moreover, he didn’t do it alone, he also shared the journey with those who were older and wiser, those who knew what to expect but travelled anyway.

Will I limit my resolutions for the new year to those that can be achieved beside my metaphorical fireplace?

As I reflect on this, I think about our church community: those whose faith has been tested by experience, and those who are afraid to take their first steps into a wider world. A mixture of people who tell stories of spiritual wonder and joy, and others who seek comfort and refuge in the familiar. I’m also reminded of the people in this local community who have needed comfort during times of suffering. My soul has become filled with experiences, and I know that there are more frightening ‘dragons’ out there than those I encounter on a long bicycle ride.

As I stand in the Vicarage garden, shivering, I wonder if I’m at risk of becoming timid. Do my experiences, and those I’ve learned from others, teach me to tread more carefully in the year to come? Will I limit my resolutions for the new year to those that can be achieved beside my metaphorical fireplace? Do I hang up my cycling shoes for those furry lined Crocs my son bought me this year?

As I type this I realise, I have no desire to surrender to slippers just yet: my aspirations for the year ahead are to fly recklessly in the face of my own painful experiences, to embrace boldness in cycling, faith, and ministry once again. I pray for joy in my heart, and youth in my soul. I hope that my faith filled foolishness will be infectious in our church and our community as I stand hand in hand with the Divine, on the edge of eternity… and jump together. And as for wisdom born of experience: next time I take the dog into the garden, I’ll put a jumper on.

Article

Assisted dying

Comment

29 October 2024

4 min read

Assisted Dying logic makes perfect sense but imposes a dreadful dilemma

The case for assisted dying appeals to choice and autonomy, yet not all choices are good. It means vast numbers of people will face a terrible choice as their life nears its end.

Graham Tomlin

Graham is the Director of the Centre for Cultural Witness and a former Bishop of Kensington.

A black and white picture shows a woman head and shoulders, she is looking up and to the side in an unsure way.

Anastasiya Badun on Unsplash.

Two broad cultural trends have led us to our current debate over assisted suicide.

One is the way consumer choice has come to be seen as the engine of successful economies. Emerging from Adam Smith’s theories of rational choice based on self-interest, given a boost by Reaganomics and Thatcherite thinking in the 1990s, the provision of a range of choice to the consumer is usually argued, with some logic, as key to the growth of western economies and the expansion of freedom.

The other is the notion of individual autonomy. Articulated especially in the past by figures such as John Locke and John Stuart Mill, the idea that individuals should be free to choose to dispose of their property, their time and their talents as they choose, as long as they don’t harm anyone else, has become standard moral fare in the modern world.

Put these two together, and the logic of assisted dying makes perfect sense. What can be wrong with offering someone a choice? Why should the state restrict individual freedom to end your life in the way you might decide to do so?

Yet expanding choice is not always good. Forcing an employee to choose between betraying a colleague or losing their job is not a fair choice. There are some choices that are unfair to impose upon people.

Assisted dying will lead us to this kind of choice. Imagine a woman in her eighties, living in a home which is her main financial asset, and which she hopes to leave to her children when she dies. She contracts Parkinson’s or dementia, which will not kill her for some time, but will severely limit her ability to live independently (and remember about of third of the UK population will need some kind of longer-term care assistance as we get older). At present, her only options are to be cared for by her children, or to sell her house to pay for professional care.

With the assisted suicide bill, a third option comes into play – to end it all early and save the family the hassle - and the money. If the bill passes, numerous elderly people will be faced with an awful dilemma. Do I stay alive, watch the kids’ inheritance disappear in care costs, or land myself on them for years, restricting their freedom by needing to care for me? Or do I call up the man with the tablets to finish it soon? Do I have a moral duty to end it all? At present, that is not a choice any old person has to make. If the bill passes, it will be one faced by numerous elderly, or disabled people across the country.

Even though the idea may have Christian roots, you don’t have to be religious to believe the vulnerable need to be protected.

Of course, supporters of the bill will say that the proposed plan only covers those who will die within six months, suffering from an “inevitably progressive condition which cannot be reversed by treatment.” Yet do we really think it will stay this way? Evidence from most other countries that have taken this route suggests that once the train leaves the station, the journey doesn’t end at the first stop - it usually carries on to the next. And the next. So, in Canada, a bill that initially allowed for something similar was changed within five years to simply requiring the patient to state they lived with an intolerable condition. From this year, there is a proposal on the table that says a doctor’s note saying you have a mental illness is enough. In the same time frame, 1,000 deaths by assisted dying in the first year has become 10,000 within five years, accounting for around 1 in 20 of all deaths in Canada right now. Some MPs in the UK are already arguing for a bill based on ‘unbearable suffering’ as the criterion. Once the train starts, there is no stopping it. The logic of individual choice and personal autonomy leads inexorably in that direction.

Of course, some people face severe pain and distress as they die, and everything within us cries out to relieve their suffering. Yet the question is what kind of society do we want to become? One where we deem some lives worth living and others not? Where we make numerous elderly people feel a burden to their families and feel a responsibility to die? In Oregon, where Assisted Dying is legal, almost half of those who opted for assisted dying cited fear of being a burden as a factor in their decision. Or would we prefer one where the common good is ultimately more important than individual choice, and where to protect the vulnerable, we find other ways to manage end of life pain, putting resources into developing palliative care and supporting families with dependent members – none of which will happen if the option of assisted dying is available.

Even though the idea may have Christian roots, you don’t have to be religious to believe the vulnerable need to be protected. Changing the law might seem a small step. After all, doctors routinely administer higher doses of morphine which alleviate pain and allow a natural death to take its course. Yet that is a humane and compassionate step to take. To confront numerous people, elderly, disabled and sick with a dreadful dilemma is one we should not impose upon them.