Chaplain's Corner

Early in January I sat with a woman in her 70’s that is afflicted with a number of lung problems. The problems have for the most part created significant limitations to her ability to be active, consequently she reads a lot. As we talked she reflected on the fact that she so often feels worthless.

Now this isn’t the first conversation I have had about worthlessness. I had a very similar conversation with a woman who had passed her 100th birthday, and another one with a young woman who lives with a significant physical handicap. These conversations stir me to reflect on what gives worth to a human life.

Now, granted this is a philosophical question, but philosophy is not the work of grey-haired academics but the work of every human being. My experience with the academic philosophers is that after all the theoretical postulation; they are for the most part scratching their heads like the rest of us. Yet as weighty as these kinds of questions are, they are “our” questions and we are responsible to find our own” answer one way or another.

So what gives a life worth? Is it standing in society? In many cultures you would think so. We sometimes behave that way. We go all goofy about the wedding of Prince William to Kate as if somehow, their love and their union are so much more important than any other; as if somehow their lives are worth so much more than others. Certainly the tabloid media must believe this for they wouldn’t devote a second to the wedding of two young people in Grunthal, Manitoba, but they spend millions to purchase pictures of the wedding of the “Royals” or some celebrity. No disrespect intended, but William and Kate are just two people whose lives are of no greater worth than yours or mine.

Well then, maybe it is vitality and the ability to make a significant contribution to one’s world that makes a life worth something? Certainly many think so. We give Nobel Prizes to people who make significant contributions, we pay them unbelievable sums of money to address gatherings, and we quote them and print pictures of them on t-shirts. Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful for those brilliant minds who envision breakthroughs that positively impact many. But does their contribution make them of any greater value than the person who escapes a certain death because they receive the life saving medication the other invented?

The Christian Faith, at least in its purest form, bases the worth of a human being on just one thing: the fact that each human being is a unique creation for God and bears in his or her being the image of God. This is what distinguished the first human being from all the other creatures God created. Human beings alone were created in God’s image. Theologians have debated exactly what “the image of God” might be. For matters related to this question, it really doesn’t matter. If each human bears in their being the image of God, then regardless of their status, wealth, educational achievement, popularity, productivity or any other standard used to value a human life – every person is a person of worth, equal worth, for the only standard is that we are bearers of “God’s image”.

Now, some of you might be thinking – OK, maybe you are right, so what? Does it make any difference whatsoever? If we truly believe this it makes an astounding amount of difference. For if we believe this then, Donald Trump and the homeless man under the bridge are of equal worth and would be treated with equal esteem. If we believe this the Olympian who sets world records is of equal worth to the disabled man who is incapable of brushing his own teeth and we would treat them with equal esteem. If this is true the doctor who day after day performs life saving heart surgery is of no greater value than the housekeeper who cleans the surgical suite at the end of the day and we would treat them with equal esteem.

Why is it that Mother Teresa is so deeply respected, not only by Catholics, but by Protestants, people of many other Faiths and even those who embrace no faith at all? Because by her very life, by her everyday acts of love and kindness in the poorest areas of one of the poorest places on earth she acknowledged the worth of every person she encountered. By showing regard, kindness, mercy and love to those in the slums of Calcutta, India, Mother Teresa she demonstrated an essential tenet of the Christian Faith that the worth of a person is established by one thing and one thing alone – each individual is created bearing the image of God.

We have a long, long way to go to living out that reality. We are so very much influenced by our culture in that we still esteem worth based on social standing, wealth, talent, popularity, contribution to society and other quite external factors. The Christian belief that values every life, every life equally is wrapped in mystery. But one can not embrace the Christian Faith at all if he/she is unwilling to embrace mystery.

One of the greater mysteries in this regard is that of babies that die before they are born or who die shortly after they are born. In regards to the unborn, our society does not even afford them human status let alone esteeming them as persons of worth. We use the word “fetus” or a dehumanizing phrase like “products of conception” which allow us to disregard one of the most profound of mysteries:  the creation of and the conclusion of a human life before even a day is lived outside the womb. But if you are the mother of such a child, no one can convince you that what happened is anything less than the death of “a baby”.

Those children, who die as they are being born or soon after birth, are every bit as valuable as the person who lives long and makes a beautiful contribution to the world. Both came into existence bearing the image of the Creator, the length of each one’s life was set by the same one who created them and each fulfills the destiny to which the creator appointed them. Length of days is irrelevant to the value of the life. This is one of the truths that many Christians hold – evening the face of the ridicule that others pour upon them for such a belief.

This is what motivates Christian people to treat with sacred respect the remains of a miscarried child or the body of a child disfigured by birth defect and unable to live outside the womb. This is what motivates Christian people to love and value the person with developmental disabilities or the once well person ravaged by disease or accident. This is what causes Christian people to rise up, even when there is a hint of movement towards euthanasia because such movement is known to grow from the seeds of patent disrespect for human life, unless that human life meets some artificial standard for worth, and in too many cases that standard revolves around economics and convenience.

Every year at this time I host a service for families who have experienced the loss of a child through miscarriage or death during or shortly after birth. I do this because I want to encourage us all to value these lives, to esteem them and honor them for what they were, people, created in the image of God. If you would like to join me for that service it will be held on Wednesday, May 23rd, at 1:00 p.m. at the Heritage Cemetery on Loewen Blvd. Just look for the white tent.

Please ask yourself this question:  Do I treat any one or any category of people as if they have less worth than me? If you do, please ask yourself a second question: What is the standard I judge worth on? Then, one last question:  If something would happen to you and you could no longer meet that standard, how do you want to be treated?