To The Reader’s Forum:

Charlie Gard, do you know of whom I speak? He’s the 11-month-old child in Great Britain sentenced by the government to die. According to that government, his rare disease is not worth the resources for treatment and his quality of life is so poor that regardless of the parent’s wishes and means to treat him, the child must die. The parents have the funds and promises of health care over here in America, but the single-payer system over there takes the right of the child’s care away from the parents. The government-run death panel has ordered that the child die with dignity, if that’s what you call it. The parents don’t even have the choice to take him home to die. (You would think that as pet owners possess the prerogative to have their beloved pets die at home, that right, at least, would be extended to parents with their deathly sick child.) This is what you get when government takes control. It usurps the rights of the parents to care for their children.

This has ghoulish similarities to Case K. In 1939, this 5-month-old blind and deformed child “seemed to be idiotic.” Under orders, Dr. Karl Brandt administered a drug called luminal putting him to sleep causing death in just days. Case K was the first case of the euthanasia program which put to death over 275,000 others like him considered “unworthy of living” and it wasn’t an insurance company who issued the orders for administering the program. The father made a request to Hitler to put his disabled son to death and Hitler ordered it to be done. As the father handed over his parental authority, how many other parents blindly relinquished control to Hitler before he categorically usurped it?

Unlike those parents, Charlie Gard’s parents taking responsibility and exercising God-given authority over him are blocked by heavy-handed government in Britain, denying them the care of their choosing. The pro-life community is stepping up with tremendous support for them, but it’s sickening to see anemic mainline churches pathetically side with the bullying of socialistic government.

Government has its roles and parents have their roles. It’s for the parents, not the government, to ultimately decide the options for the care of their children. The current case of Charlie Gard has huge implications for us as a people. Do we trust and empower the death panels of government-run “health care” or parents who are freed up and trust God?

The Rev. Mel McGinnis

Frewsburg