When Is It Right to Die: Suicide, Euthanasia, Suffering, Mercy

Joni Eareckson Tada was confronted with these questions not only as she struggled against her own paralysis, but as she sat in her wheelchair by the bedside of her dying father. So much suffering, so much pain, she thought. Why not end it all quickly. Painlessly? More and more people who are terminally ill are choosing assisted suicide. Other groups such as the elderly, the disabled, or even the depressed or suicidal are being swept up into this movement of self deliverance. These are tempting enticements to those who hurt. When is it right to die? Counterbalances such quick fix advice with alternatives of hope, compassion, and death with real dignity. Tada offers to help those who are assisted death measures on their state ballots and wonder when legalized suicide will become a reality. Behind ever booklet printed by a right to die or a right to life group is a family. A family like yours. A disabled person like Joni. In her warm, personal way, Joni takes the reader into the lives of families, the elderly, the disabled, and the terminally ill, and lets them speak about assisted death. What they say is surprising. For those who agonize over the when and the how of dying at the time when assisted suicide is being openly debated, when is it right to die give guidance toward answers that are ethical, appropriate, and right in an age of advanced medical technology, who has not pondered the questions, how do I want to die? Can I control the way I will one day die? This book is for those who want help for the single national issue that will personally touch everyone’s life. Tada doesn’t give pat conclusions. She doesn’t hold to the position of life support when death is imminent. Instead she gives warm comfort from God and her experience and practical help to meet the hard, cold realities for those facing or considering, death. Not a dissertation on ethics, this book is filled with personal stories of real individuals facing life- and –death questions and finding hope.