The church has hired two new suicide prevention workers. You might suppose that their focus would be on the recovery of those unfortunate enough to have accidentally overdosed on ACoC sermons. But no, they will be working on Indigenous suicide prevention, a worthy endeavour, without doubt.
The irony is that while these new hires will be working to prevent suicide among
Indigenous people, as indeed they should, many of the rest of the clergy are perfectly happy to go along with, and even attend, bless and sanctify, state assisted suicide simply because it is now legal in Canada.
For example, the new bishop of Toronto, Andrew Asbil was present at a recent joint euthanizing.
From here:
The Anglican Church of Canada has hired two new suicide prevention workers as part of its Indigenous ministry.
Jeffery Stanley, a master of divinity student at the Vancouver School of Theology, began work June 25; Yolanda Bird, a former member of Council of General Synod (CoGS) with extensive experience working with children and youth, began July 3.
Each will be responsible for helping deliver existing suicide prevention programs in the dioceses in their areas, as well as helping develop new ones, said Indigenous ministries co-ordinator Canon Ginny Doctor. Their work will also include developing teams of volunteers in dioceses where the need for suicide prevention is especially high, she said.
Not just the Anglican church, but in our current culture at large. The same people will be in favour of both preventing suicide in some cases and assisting it in others. They are like a snake swallowing its own tail.
This would be an incredibly funny joke if it were not for the fact that people are literally murdering themselves and in so doing committing a horrendous sin that some believe would condemn their souls to the eternal fires of hell.
You can almost here it. “Hey, All you white people. If you want to off yourselves we will be there to make you feel that it is ok, and even a good thing for you to do.”
“Hey. All you FIRST NATIONS people. You are so incredibly special that we are going to take action to prevent you from harming yourselves. After all, you are FIRST, and that makes you better and more important than everyone else.”
AMPisAnglican: I am not sure that making light of the epidemic of teen suicides in our Northern indigenous communities (First Nations and Inuit) advances this debate. One might even argue that it is offensive. I know that there are many clergy and lay ministers across the North (including the leaders of the Diocese of the Arctic like David Parsons and Darren MacCartney) who are working hard to tackle these issues. If this initiative adds to the resources and support available to vulnerable youth, then it is to be welcomed. It is not about being ‘incredibly special’ – it is about being children of God, who deserve protection.
I assure you that as a First Nations’ person, who is a Christian, and also attends an Anglican church, trust me, I’m not walking around thinking I’m “special”–nor is any First Nations’ person that I know. Instead, we’re busy noticing the complete lack of regard general society has for the land, the environmental degradation, the racism, the materialism, the greed. Have you been to Vancouver lately and seen how the whole Lower Mainland has been handed over to the developers? And, as an aside, how many Anglican Churches truly care from their heart–both ANic and ACoC–about First Nations’ people? Not too many if we’re being honest–one gets the feeling that they care more about gay people than First Nations’ people. Who cares about silly reconciliation walks and the like? Pick an Anglican church in the Lower Mainland and count up how many First Nations’ people you’ll find in the pews–not too many. There’s a reason for that. As an aside, in truth, they are practically ZERO Churches in the Lower Mainland where anyone of First Nations’ heritage is going to be welcomed. But, we have Churches for Anglos, we have Churches for Mennonites (LOTS of those), Churches for Dutch, Churches for Chinese. So, trust me AMPisAnglican, trust me–no First Nations’ person is walking around thinking they are just soooo special.
With the “right to die” legalized, why exactly do we need suicide prevention centres anymore? Isn’t preventing suicide actually an infringement on someone’s absolute “right to die”?
Yet another example of the internal contradictions of progressive ideology.
(And – hey! – let’s get really utilitarian here: think of the money governments and other organizations can save by closing up all those suicide prevention centres with their 24/7 hotlines that we clearly no longer require! What a tangled web we weave indeed.)
In practice, what it means is that not everyone has the right to die. The society seems to decide to prevent some deaths, and to allow other deaths at the same time.