Death on Demand #4 - How MAiD Threatens the Vulnerable

One of the most striking patterns in church history is how distinct Christian communities were from the surrounding pagan culture. And one of the clearest marks of that distinction was how they valued life, especially the vulnerable: the unborn, the unwanted, the poor, and the sick. They lived out the doctrine of the imago Dei in a world that often discarded or devalued the weak.

The doctrine of imago Dei, rooted in the first chapters of Genesis, teaches that all human beings are made in the image of God. This means they have intrinsic value—not because of their capabilities or contributions to society, but simply because they are human. In the West, we often take for granted the idea that human life has worth, dignity, and rights—but this is not a universal belief. It is a direct fruit of Christianity.

But we need to realize: you cannot have the fruit without the tree. The fruit without the tree rots and dies. We cannot expect to preserve the blessings of Christian ethics while rejecting the Lordship of Christ. And this is exactly what we are witnessing in our culture: the slow death of foundational truths like the sacredness of human life. Abortion and MAiD are symptoms of that decay. Abortion discards the unborn. MAiD discards the vulnerable.

Of course, these acts come packaged as mercy, wrapped in the language of freedom and dignity. That’s because our culture is still running on the fading memory of Christian values. We still sense that devaluing human life is wrong, even as we redefine what it means to value it.

MAiD also erodes trust in the medical system. Health care professionals—once committed to preserving life—are now enlisted as agents of death. This is a sobering picture of what happens when a society abandons Christianity. The spiritual consequences are obvious, but so are the social ones. The weakening of Christian foundations does not stay in the realm of the theoretical—it affects our hospitals, our homes, and our neighbours. Canada must remember its Christian roots. Christians are called not to dispose of the vulnerable, but to protect them.

When we encounter those in extreme pain and suffering, we should not offer them the “mercy” of death, but the grace of being loved, simply because they are human. What restores dignity to the vulnerable is not death, but mercy, grace, support, and sacrificial love.

When we abandon God, love grows cold, for He is the source of love.

May God rescue us from becoming a heartless society.

Nino Marques