Paula Ritchie was the focus of a long New York Times article on June 1, 2025, regarding “Medical Assistance in Dying” (MAiD). She struggled for years with relentless, crippling pain that the doctors could not understand. Her story is heartbreaking. Pain like Paula’s is a grim consequence of Adam and Eve’s rebellion. Her case reminds us that some people feel the effects of the fall more intensely than others.
If we have a way of walking alongside someone like Paula, we should seize it. We should oppose laws allowing medical assistance in dying, but we should be most eager to find ways to love and seek to listen well to people who see a quick, painless death as a “solution.”
Paula’s story unfolds in Canada, where medical assistance in dying is available nationwide. In the United States, 10 states have laws that allow physicians, nurses, and pharmacists to help people die “on their own terms” in a “humane and dignified way.” The assistance is usually a mixture of drugs that cause relaxation, sleep, and then death. At first, these laws only allowed terminally ill people to use medical assistance in dying. Recently, such restrictions on who may receive this kind of assistance are being removed, and the number of U.S. states and countries allowing medical assistance in dying is expected to grow.
Our lives are not our property
God’s Word teaches that our lives belong to God, who owns all things (see Ps. 24:1; Deut. 10:14). As the giver of life, only God has the authority to take life. Human life is particularly important to God. Genesis 1:26–27 teaches that humans are God’s image bearers. We are all God’s servants, so our lives belong to God, not to us.
By contrast, most people today think that we own our lives. Almost all the comments responding to the New York Times article support medical assistance in dying. “Our lives belong to us” is the basis for this support. Why not, they argue, allow medical experts to use their training to help people end their lives? If they are in pain and want to die, isn’t it cruel not to help them?
It is tempting to think that stopping medical assistance in dying is the greatest need for Christians. That need is great indeed, but drawing near to desperate people should also be important. Both needs deserve our attention. Loving people who see causing their own death as a solution is something we can do now.
Drawing near to those in pain
People in pain find it easy to believe that they only give others grief and frustration. They need friends who will show up and cherish them in the midst of their pain. When medicine cannot eliminate the pain, medical providers can struggle to be encouraging and supportive. They feel the pressure to do something, which can make assisting a “peaceful” death seem compassionate. However, people in pain need friends who are not overwhelmed by the pain and who can draw close as an act of love.
We show love to those in pain by not backing away. We may not know what to say. We know we can’t take the pain away. We want to do something. Yet the most important thing we can do is be there, crying out to the Lord on their behalf. We can listen to their stories, asking to hear more when given the opportunity. We can talk of mutual interests. In all of these ways, we show that they are valued members of our community.
Drawing near can also look like praying out loud with them and simply talking to them about Jesus. Jesus calls everyone to use their powers to serve Him, and even people in great pain are still fully image bearers with the ability to pray. Their prayers contribute to the shared human task of exercising dominion over God’s creation. Jesus knows better than anyone what it means to endure intense pain all the way to death. He died having been abandoned by everyone. His resurrection makes it clear that pain and death do not have the last word.
Against dehumanizing people
The authority to make choices for ourselves (autonomy) is not the basis of human dignity. Human dignity rests on being made in the image of God. Image bearers are stewards of God’s world. We have the authority of stewards, not owners, even over our own bodies. Medical assistance in dying dehumanizes everyone by denying our status as God’s appointed agents. Praying and working against medical assistance in dying defends true human dignity.
Physicians, nurses, and pharmacists who see that medical assistance in dying is dehumanizing can decline to participate in the places where the practice is legal. Christian medical professionals are not the only ones who see that medical assistance in dying is hostile to human dignity. Christians, however, have clear biblical reasons for not participating.
Recognizing the limits of medicine
Defending human dignity is a sufficient reason to work against medical assistance in dying laws and practices. Defending the integrity of medical practice is another good reason. Physicians, nurses, and pharmacists are healers by conviction, inclination, and training. In effect, medical assistance in dying laws and practices are asking them to be killers. Medical assistance in dying makes it harder for people to trust that medical professionals are focused on their healing. It also encourages medical professionals to see their patients as problems rather than people.
The medical assistance in dying movement is often motivated by compassion. But it is a compassion that looks to solve problems that are not merely medical. Christian wisdom recognizes the limits of medicine. Even when medicine cannot make the pain stop, the love of family and friends can do what medicine cannot. Loving, listening, present friends can provide what those in pain need to embrace life until God’s time for them comes.
This article was first published in Tabletalk, the Bible study magazine of Ligonier Ministries. Find out more at TabletalkMagazine.com or subscribe today at GetTabletalk.com.
Dr. William C. Davis is professor of philosophy at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Ga., and adjunct professor of philosophy at Reformed Theological Seminary. He is author or contributor to many books, including Departing in Peace: Biblical Decision-Making at the End of Life and Reason for the Hope Within.
