The nursing profession is an interesting one putting into consideration the things a nurse has to encounter every day. However, some of the daily occurrences could be a hard task to an individual and might demand a lot of experience and skills to handle them appropriately. A person would be dealing with different people from varied cultures with divergent beliefs. Healthcare professionals who are better at handling the various beliefs among their patients are exceptionally placed to work in advanced healthcare conditions. Most cultures around the world highly regards a family but at the same time they may have contradicting and complex religious beliefs affecting how they handle life issues such as health. However, some people also intertwine different religious and cultural ideas due to increased interactions among people from diverse cultures (Buddanet.com, 2017). This implies that they agree with a few of the beliefs from other cultures while also disagreeing with others. They also disagree with some of the beliefs in their own cultures. The increased rate of inter-religious marriages indicates that people have learned to accept some ideas from other cultures. At the same time, in some occurrences, they even abandon their faith to another one. Even with this resilience, persons would still hold on to beliefs that influence their crucial decision.
How would George interpret his suffering in light of the Christian narrative, with an emphasis on the fallenness of the world?
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Once people decide to seek medical attention to the healthcare issues they face, they can lose their societal values based on the nature of their problems. Patients no longer blindly adhere to the treatments or treatment methods their physicians have selected. Many patients may reject some forms of treatment methods prescribed by their physicians simply because their religion does not support these treatment methods ( Pomfret, Mufti, & Seale, 2018). George is identified in the case study as a patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) that is slowly killing him. It is unfortunate and sad that George would be fully aware of the things that happen to him as well as his slow death process, but would not be able to talk to anyone about what he needs.
From the time he was told about the disease’s progression, George agreed to go for voluntary euthanasia (EuroMed Info, 2016). This is the subject of this paper where I attempts to explain the perspective of both Buddhism and Christianity on end-of-life healthcare decisions. Decisions regarding the end of life are mostly influenced by the religious beliefs that individuals adhere to and, thus, determine they are applied in real-life situations.
How would George interpret his suffering in light of the Christian narrative, with an emphasis on the hope of resurrection?
Christians believe that God created everything that exists in this world, and Jesus Christ came to earth to give a physical body to the highest God so that Christians could see God in their picture (Worldview, 2017).
Christians will argue that whatever happens to George is the will of God through different churches and offer various reasons for the illness (Buddanet.com, 2017). Others would argue that such an illness can only influence the victim in order to bring him closer to his God and to learn about Christ’s suffering. In contrast, another party would argue that God allows such suffering because George lacks spiritual belief. This intention aims to encourage people by following all the teachings from the Holy Book to be closer to their creator. As Christians, we may fear death, but certainly, it is only an end but not the end. The power of resurrection and when the interventions to preserve life may seem brutal, Christians should doggedly pursue them for the preservation of life. Looking at suffering as the will of God allows Christians to remain steadfast in their faith and beliefs, and thus become stronger than before. When they believe the pain could be due to what they have done in the past, then it allows them to repent of their sins and return to their Lord.
The explanations also show that God does things in a calculated and orderly way, that he allows suffering because he wants his people to come back to him and feel his love for them (EuroMed Info, 2016). If people do wrong things and have their sins punished, it still reveals the love of God for them and helps them to aspire and live as their creator wants to do. Such explanations could help George decide to evaluate his life and confess to God while, at the same time, knowing in his heart that he has been forgiven and that his pain will no longer be as soon as he dies.
As George contemplates life with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), how would the Christian worldview inform his view about the value of his life as a person?
Christianity regards life as something precious which has been handed over to human beings, and no one should take it away. In this context, people are expected to endure pain, and all the pain-related experiences any time they face some mental or physical health. Such events should not make a person decide to end his life. Christians also believe that one should remain strong because the pain will no longer be after they die, and they will be reborn in new bodies. Because of these religious beliefs, George has to choose his end of life (Worldview, 2017). He is considering voluntary euthanasia as a way out of the impending misery that appears to be a better option as he will suffer but end up dead at the end.
What sorts of values and considerations would the Christian worldview focus on in deliberating about whether or not George should opt for euthanasia?
In everybody’s view, the question is whether the procedure is incorrect or right. The viewpoint and the answer people hold or give to such a question depends a great deal on where an individual stands. The majority of patients who choose these choices see them as the right thing to do to prevent extreme suffering before they die. Others also claim that if it is ok to do the same for animals, then it is not wrong to do the same for humans and give them happiness by putting an end to their misery (Worldview, 2017). The Christians will answer the question by referring to the Ten Commandments that give them orders not to destroy. Suicide involves killing because it consists of a process that takes the life of a person. Thus, committing suicide or helping a person to commit suicide would be against God’s commandment, “ Thou shall not kill .” Suicide involves taking away one’s life, which is also murder.
The Christians should not be in fear even when they face death in the face because the Bible states that the “ Lord giveth and the Lord taketh .” The people who take away their lives are against God’s will and fail to acknowledge God’s love of gifting life to them. Buddhists are moreover teaching to abstain from any frame of killings or to cause hurt to any living thing (Cheng, (2017). In this sense, they consider suicide as an act that includes both murdering and causing harm to oneself (EuroMed Data, 2016). The Buddhists, too, accept that passing through hardships in life and life makes a way to proceed to the pure land when it comes to Nirvana (Buddanet.com, 2017). Taking one’s life is disturbing the cycle and makes the individual be renewed or resurrected into another life full of enduring and torment. After passing away, life is given to the sanctified. Therefore, George might spend his remaining day’s upbeat, knowing that after his passing away, he will have another life without the torment that he is experiencing right now.
Given the above, what options would be morally justified in the Christian worldview for George and why?
Christianity back the thought of according George the characteristic care that would empower him to live his final days on soil within the best quality of life conceivable. Christianity is additionally not against the utilize of solutions amid this arrangement of life to ease the torment that one might involvement, which implies that George might be utilizing drugs to reduce his torment indeed as days proceed to diminish in this world.
Utilization of drugs would too offer assistance to concentrate on doing anything that he wishes to as his time comes. The torment would be worse if he chose to spend his final days dormant and fair resting in his passing bed.
On the other hand, the medicines would empower him to visit any place he wishes to attend and hence return home a more joyful man as contradicted to abandoning treatment which would be an agonizing involvement contributing to making him pitiful. A life free from torment moreover makes it conceivable for a person to think clearly and make choices that he or she might not lament afterward in their lives. In this sense, the medical interventions would contribute monstrously towards guaranteeing that George does not go through an agonizing moments in the remaining days of his life.
Based on your worldview, what decision would you make if you were in George’s situation?
As a Christian student who shares beliefs and ideals of the Christian teachings, I find it wrong to aid George into taking his life. God placed us on earth with a purpose to have the feelings of love, joy, pain, suffering, and with which we will get to experience eternal life once we die. The use of pharmacological interventions to reduce the pain George is in accordance with the Christian religious doctrines. However, interventions to quicken his death in the name of minimizing suffering brings in questions even to the Christian health professionals, that of the sin against God. These interventions are bound to cause his death, and this can be linked to committing murder since there’s the termination of life.
God intended life to be sacred and immortal and is a gift that should be cherished and not taken away. Being George, I would continuously revisit Genesis, where the almighty breathed life into the pioneers of earth, Adam and Eve, and remind myself that being a descendant, I am then obligated to preserve life, cherish it because I have purposefully been placed on earth to serve him. Alone, the tenet should steer me up towards protecting life and vehemently protest euthanasia. God, the almighty knows the reason for my pain, and hence I would endure it. As such, I would accept the available treatment and continue believing that there will be a potential cure, and as a Christian, I would wait upon until the day God chose to take me away (death).
References
Buddanet.com (2017) Basic Buddhism guide. Retrieved from http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/basic-guide.htm
Cheng, F. K. (2017). Buddhist insights into life and death: Overcoming death anxiety. Athens Journal of Social Sciences , 4 (1), 67-87.
EuroMed Info. (2016). How culture influences health beliefs. Retrieved from http://www.euromedinfo.eu/how-culture-influences-health-beliefs.html/
Pomfret, S., Mufti, S., & Seale, C. (2018). Medical students and end-of-life decisions: the influence of religion. Future healthcare journal , 5 (1), 25.
Worldview, (2017) Helping you better understand the world’s cultures and beliefs systems. Retrieved from http://www.worldviewu.org/
