You are also in error with regard to stating that almost every major hospital is run by religious organizations. In Seattle, there are no hospitals owned or operated by any religious organizations. Harborview Medical Center and the UW Medical Center, Swedish Medical Center, Virginia Mason Hospital are examples. Even in Tacoma where Franciscan Healthcare’s St. Joseph’s Hospital exists, there are several major non-religious based hospitals who serve as many patients as at St. Joe’s.

If you choose to go to a Catholic hospital, then you need to respect the fact that they must obey their moral conscience. No one has the right to dictate to them otherwise. No person is forcing you to seek medical attention at a Catholic hospital or hospice program. For you to think that the Catholic Church is pushing their beliefs on patients such as yourself is ridiculous. It is illogical. They do have the right to not participate in actions that will take human life – and according to Catholic Canon Law Catholics cannot give out information or referrals on Initiative 1000. For you to expect or demand a Catholic physician or hospital to do that is unethical even by non-Catholic medical standards. No patient has the right to, under medical ethics, to demand treatment. Ethically, you as a patient can decline treatment. But you cannot demand it. You do not ethically have the right to demand from a Catholic healthcare employee to provide information or referrals for lethal barbituates, because of these standards I have summarized.

I think for any patient or family member to demand information on lethal barbituates from Peacehealth or any Catholic healthcare institution is dictating and forcing that person’s own moral convictions on the Catholic provider.

Each person has to honor his/her conscience. You can’t force someone to go against that. The Shapiros and Mr. Miller are way out of line here. It is not PeaceHealth’s responsibility to inform the Shapiros or anyone else of where they need to go to obtain a lethal barbituate – or to make them aware that Initiative 1000 passed.

Initiative 1000 is not what it might seem. You think it is a compassionate law. But it encourages those who are vulnerable who may feel they are a burden to their loved ones to end their lives, especially in these current difficult economic times. A wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Most voters I have spoken with did not read the law before they voted. But if they had, they would have seen that law mandates the falsification of the death record. The death certificate must state the terminal illness caused the death – not the lethal barbituate. The word “suicide” or any inference to it cannot be written on the death record. Funeral directors are asked to ensure that the attending physician complies.

I am sorry that physicians are not getting more in tune with hospice care. We really need to improve hospice care for patients who are dying. It is possible to manage pain. It is not necessary to use a lethal barbituate to address this.

But even if this were not the case, it would still be wrong. Who ever said that there should be no suffering in this life? Physical pain is part of being alive. Death is like giving birth – and there is something greater than ourselves awaiting us at the time of our deaths. I saw this with my parents’ deaths.

I regret that Initiative 1000 passed, because as more and more States pass this law, there may be no way out for those who want to opt out. The next steps may be mandatory euthanasia for persons who are elderly and those who are very ill, who use too much of the taxpayers’ money for healthcare. You think this is far fetched?

It isn’t. There are powers in this Universe which you are not aware of. Look at what happened to the Jews in Nazi Germany. Big change does not happen overnight. More gradual changes happen first, so that everyone becomes accustomed. The Jews were not ushered into gas chambers at first. At first their neighborhoods were barracaded. Bit by bit changes were introduced, so that when they were finally directed to the gas chambers, they were still in denial. It was too late.

When cast out from the nest of immortality
the first man
walked alone astonished
immersed in his own thoughts through woods and fields,
tormented and reprimanded
by the light, horizon, clouds -
and from every flower the memories of paradise
arrowed his skin -
and the first men, the vagrant, didn’t know how to cry.
Once, tired by the blue skies’ brightness of spring
with a childish soul
the first man felt face in dust:
Master, take my eyesight away, or if you can,
Cobweb my eyes with a jewel
for I no longer wish to see
neither flowers, nor sky
nor Eve’s smiles, nor clouds
because, you see,
their brightness hurts.
And then, in a moment of pity
the Merciful gave him the tears.

Translation from Romanian by: Viorel Verka.