Pressing Issues
Diseases frequently tend to cause various sufferings and illness that unleashes the search towards the meaning and for the understanding of the devastating experiences (Rafferty, Billig & Mosack, 2015). The Bible and the context of the Christianity depict some of the holy phrases illustrating the importance of praying and faith towards Christianity and the spirit of Jesus. The assignment highlights a scenario of Mike and his blind faith on Jesus, which is holding him back to treat his son who is suffering from acute kidney failure.
The most pressing issues for this case study are Mike’s blind faith in god. Mike is leaving the entire hope of his son James over to god without doing anything fruitful or effective in terms of treatment. It is his blind faith to god, which has complicated the entire prognosis of the pathophysiological condition for James. Even when the doctor highlighted that Samuel is the best fit kidney donor for James and James has only one year in hand for kidney transplant, Mike is thinking about his faith towards Lord and dreaming of something Miracle to happen. Another pressing issue in the case study is in-appropriate initiatives form the healthcare professionals to make Mike understand that god only help those who are proactive in helping themselves. There is nothing miracle going to happen for James unless and until proper treatment is given.
Under the present scenario, the physician should no longer allow Mike to continue make decision for James. This is because, irrational thought process of Mike and his blind faith towards god has already has James overall condition critical. However, according to Kelly, Magill and Ten Have (2013), the right of autonomy and the right of informed consent is opted to the parents when the child is a minor. Here James is only 8 years old and thus he is a minor. Thus, it will be the duty of the physicians to make James parents to understand the importance of treatment for James survival. The James should also be educated from physicians perspective of importance of organ donation.
Treatment Refusal
Under the Christian narrative, human dignity is preserved under every stage of life. As per the belief of Catholics, voluntary of direct killing of innocent life is gravely wrong. When a life-saving or life-sustaining treatment is withdrawn with an intension that a miracle will happen, it is considered to be unethical. It is also considered as euthanasia or suicide. Christianity is against euthanasia (Brown & Slutzky, 2017). Thus as per the Christian narrative, Mike’s approach of treatment refusal is not supported as it is hampering James life. By refusing treatment for James, Mike is actually endangering life of his son and thus against Christianity.
Patient Autonomy from Christian narrative is somewhat oxymoron. This is because, the life of Christian is bounded by the God’s sovereign direction. The people who are Christian is constrained by the moral parameters of God’s word and the overall activity of Holy Spirit under the proper guidance and god’s direction. Under Christianity, freedom can never be used as a pretest for doing evil. It is considered as life of slaves. It is hardly an imagery thing that would help to promote unconstrained autonomy. Thus the condition of Mike cannot be explained under the Christianity principle of autonomy (Wilson et al., 2014).
Physicians Perspective
There is nothing-specific written in Bible that will prevent Christian from organ donation or accepting organ through transplant. However, since the last book of the Bible was written nearly 2000 years ago, the subject of organ transplant is not specifically mentioned in Bible but the principle of Bible do not proposed against donation (Ralph et al., 2014). According to Ralph et al. (2014), organ donation is giving an organ to someone to help someone in order to survive. The Christian fait is erected on the revelation of God in the life of Christ. It is the Christ who taught to love people and embrace the needs to others and thus Christianity vouch in favor of organ donation.
The history regarding the religion of Christianity has witnessed numerous debates regarding the concepts and the attitudes towards the issues of health and suffering and the relevant confrontation regarding fraility and human illness (Aldwin et al., 2017). The theoretical notions regarding the suffering and the death of Jesus is thus viewed mostly by the redemptive valuations regarding the context of suffering. The Bible and the context of Christianity depict how the god creates the physical and the spiritual life of humans. The human bodies endure sickness, decay, pain, and suffering sometimes which needs medical care and help. The concept of Christianity does not promise the healing without medical care. According to the Bible, God heals human pain in the ways that defy the knowledge of the medicine. It is thus never wrong towards the praying to Jesus for healing. The bible and the Christianity thus tells to pray together with respecting the basic humanity.
What should Mike do as a Christian?
Mike’s blind faith towards the lord has been the basis of the study concerned in this assignment. Being moved by certain scenarios, Mike got more prudent towards the faith healing services.
“Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou [art] my praise”. The above phrase from the Bible illustrates the condition of Mike and his faith over the context of Christianity and the power of the Jesus. Though the Bible has never denied for the praying for the healing of the human body, it has never denied the humans towards taking any medical services. The streptococcus infection that has resulted in the failure of the kidney of James needs to be reviewed and taken care of by health care professionals (Graham, 2014). It thus the responsibility of Mike to take his son for an immediate dialysis and further transplantation of kidney to save the life of his son.
Sickness and sufferings are natural disasters that affect the body of the humans. The trust and the faith towards Jesus in the context of the religious notion of Christianity have been long praised by the Bible in its multiple phrases (Ho et al., 2016). One of his close friend fueled Mike’s faith over the praying towards the healing services in the church after some of the incidents like regaining of the mobility, instances by a sermon and their pastor and other scenarios of improvements and healing from deadly diseases. The reason by Mike regarding the trusting of the God and treatments of the James furthermore depict the stereotypical believe on Jesus and blind faith towards the Holy Spirit.
Conclusion
There is nothing-specific written in Bible that will prevent Christian from organ donation or accepting organ through transplant. Sickness and sufferings are natural disasters that affect the body of the humans. The history regarding the religion of Christianity has witnessed numerous debates regarding the concepts and the attitudes towards the issues of health and suffering and the relevant confrontation regarding fragility and human illness. The assignment thus illustrates the measures that should be taken by Mike irrespective of the notion of the Christianity on health and illness.
References
Aldwin, C. M., Igarashi, H., Gilmer, D. F., & Levenson, M. R. (2017). Health, illness, and optimal aging: Biological and psychosocial perspectives. Springer Publishing Company.
Brown, A. E. C., & Slutzky, A. R. (2017). Refusal of treatment of childhood cancer: A systematic review. Pediatrics, 140(6), e20171951.
Graham, E. (2014). A Biblical Approach to Cadaveric Organ Transplants. CedarEthics: A Journal of Critical Thinking in Bioethics, 14(1), 4.
Ho, R. T. H., Chan, C. K. P., Lo, P. H. Y., Wong, P. H., Chan, C. L. W., Leung, P. P. Y., & Chen, E. Y. H. (2016). Understandings of spirituality and its role in illness recovery in persons with schizophrenia and mental-health professionals: a qualitative study. BMC psychiatry, 16(1), 86.
Kelly, D. F., Magill, G., & Ten Have, H. (2013). Contemporary Catholic health care ethics. Georgetown University Press.
Rafferty, K. A., Billig, A. K., & Mosack, K. E. (2015). Spirituality, religion, and health: the role of communication, appraisals, and coping for individuals living with chronic illness. Journal of religion and health, 54(5), 1870-1885.
Ralph, A., Chapman, J. R., Gillis, J., Craig, J. C., Butow, P., Howard, K., … & Tong, A. (2014). Family perspectives on deceased organ donation: thematic synthesis of qualitative studies. American Journal of Transplantation, 14(4), 923-935.
Wilson, F., Ingleton, C., Gott, M., & Gardiner, C. (2014). Autonomy and choice in palliative care: time for a new model?. Journal of advanced nursing, 70(5), 1020-1029.
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