Life's Living toward Dying: A Theological and Medical-Ethical Study

by Vigen Guroian

Overview

In the past several years our culture's long-standing prohibitions against suicide and euthanasia have been seriously challenged. A great tidal change in morality and law may be occurring as the courts seem to be creating a new right -- the individual's right to die. Life's Living toward Dying responds to this challenge. Vigen Guroian discusses society's moral confusion over the meaning of death and gives a Christian alternative for care of the dying that is consistent with the strong value that the Christian church has ascribed to human life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802841902
Publisher:	Eerdmans, William B. Publishing Company
Publication date:	05/01/1996
Pages:	96
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.33(d)

About the Author

Vigen Guroian is Professor of Religious Studies in Orthodox Christianity at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. He tends a large perennial and vegetable garden with his wife, June, in Culpeper, Virginia. His books include Inheriting Paradise: Meditations on Gardening, Life's Living toward Dying (both Eerdmans), and Tending the Heart of Virtue: How Classic Stories Awaken a Child's Moral Imagination (Oxford).

Table of Contents

Preface: Dr. Kevorkian and the Thanatos Syndrome

I. The Culture of Death

1. Aversion and Obsession: Reading the Pulse of the Culture

II. The Christian Vision of Death

2. Love and Death
3. The Vision of Death

III. The Christian Ethics of Caring for the Dying

4. The Case of Baby Rena: Cultural Confusions and Ethical Clarifications
5. Caring for the Dying in the Christian Faith

Index

Editorial Reviews

Booklist
"Readers may find Guroian's weaving of a variety of literary allusions into his evocation of theological tradition instructive as they construct their own responses to death and Dr. Kevorkian."

Catholic News Service
"Thoughtful book."

Edmund D. Pellegrino, M. D. (Georgetown University Medical Center)
"This book reasserts the Christian tradition of a 'good death, ' one that cannot include euthanasia or assisted suicide. Believers will be reminded of the richness of Christian teaching about dying and salvation; nonbelievers, of the dangers of disconnecting compassion from its roots in the Christian gospel of love."

The Christian Century
"Continuing his work in liturgy and ethics, Guroian demonstrates how the Christian tradition--richly embodied in liturgical worship--provides a cogent alternative to the contemporary 'culture of death' prophetically depicted in Walker Percy's Thanatos Syndrome and exemplified in the words and deeds of Jack Kevorkian. Through an engaging analysis of literature and contemporary culture, Guroian traces the dynamics of our simultaneous aversion to and obsession with death."

From the Publisher

Thoughtful book.

Catholic News Service

"This book reasserts the Christian tradition of a "good death," one that cannot include euthanasia or assisted suicide. Believers will be reminded of the richness of Christian teaching about dying and salvation; nonbelievers, of the dangers of disconnecting compassion from its roots in the Christian gospel of love."

Edmund D. Pellegrino

"Continuing his work in liturgy and ethics, Guroian demonstrates how the Christian tradition—richly embodied in liturgical worship—provides a cogent alternative to the contemporary "culture of death" prophetically depicted in Walker Percy's Thanatos Syndrome and exemplified in the words and deeds of Jack Kevorkian. Through an engaging analysis of literature and contemporary culture, Guroian traces the dynamics of our simultaneous aversion to and obsession with death."

Christian Century