As many of you have seen, Dr. Kevorkian is being released from prison after serving 8 years of the 10 to 25 year sentence for assisting the suicide of a terminally ill man.
The Raelian Movement sends our continued support to Dr. Kevorkian for his “kicking the door open” and forcing the public to address the issue of assisted suicide. We know what it’s like to force people to talk about uncomfortable things. The Prophet Rael has been doing this for decades. Many subjects were taboo until Rael forced them into the public arenas - like human cloning, stem cell therapy, handing out condoms in schools, supporting genetically modified crops, there is no god, no such thing as evolution - just to name a few.
We find it amazing that politicians, under pressure from religious leaders and followers, contradict themselves by being against a terminally ill patient committing suicide while they are, somehow at the same time, supporting capital punishment. Theirs is a mindset which forbids someone who is suffering beyond comprehension to choose to end their own life yet they condone the calculated murder of a criminal (who are only suffering from a disease) as well as being OK with “collateral damage” in Iraq, where almost 1,000,000 innocent children have died thanks to sanctions and the subsequent illegal occupation.
Why are followers of a compassionate Prophet like Jesus against what Dr. Kevorkian did? As always, the masses are against something which does not affect them. It’s very easy to be against assisted suicide if you are not suffering with unbearable pain. It is very easy to be against stem cell research when you don’t need it yourself. It’s very easy to be against genetically modified crops if you are not starving and watching your children dying. Their “moral high ground” becomes something quite different when we realize this.
You may have read our earlier article on the death penalty. Our Creators, The Elohim of the Bible, told Rael that no man has the right to take another’s life – but that someone who is suffering should have the right to end his or her own life. Sadly, for the traditional religious paradigm, “being humane” is apparently easier to apply to suffering animals than to human beings.
How do followers of the Bible which states “thou shalt not kill” justify killing a criminal? It is not surprising at all that Christians can hold contradictory opinions on killing because the Old Testament contradicts itself by condoning on one page the famous “eye for an eye” yet on another it stating “thou shalt not kill”.
Let’s follow this a step further to try to understand better. Every Fundamentalist Christian this author has ever spoken to claims every word of the Bible to be true. The logical question we must ask is: “which version?” There are dozens of versions and they almost all contradict one another in many places. Those Christians who have worked at it the most will reply “the King James Version” – even though there are much older versions available and that the oldest source of any book is always considered more accurate. So why the KJV? When asked, they will say that “God protected His word through that version”. Hmmm…that doesn’t sound rational to us.
But OK. Again, why is it immoral to commit suicide while it’s ok to invoke the death penalty?
When asked, the most “educated” of fundamental Christians will reply “the original Hebrew word used in ‘thou shalt not kill’ did not mean quite the same thing that “kill” means today”. So then, every word is not true? Not quite true? Huh? Is it any wonder that religious leaders insist upon “faith” instead of rational thought?
If the reader would like to research, you will find many extremely important words which meant something entirely different in ancient times than today. The way these words have been changed completely changes the entire meaning of the Bible! Words like soul, religion, hell, angel, and scores more. For example, did you know that the word “Heaven” meant, literally, “the sky”. It did not mean a paradise or a place at all but meant, literally, “the sky”. It was one of many words used in the King’s English, itself a language not taught to commoners purposely to keep knowledge from common people.
We have the same situation today and “faith” is the only way a Christian can say that the Bible teaches love and tolerance while condoning the death penalty, sanctions and illegal occupation which has killed almost 1,000,000 innocent Iraqi people. Is the blood of a Christian more valuable than a Muslim child? How do you think Jesus would answer this?
There will be a day when people look back at the way we treated suffering people and the way we treated criminals and feel shame for their primitive ancestors – us. There are many great insights and teaching from The Elohim, as always, available for free when you download Intelligent Design right here from our site.
Rick Roehr, US National Guide