DUTCH LAW EXTENDS TO ALL BORN HUMANS: 
Euthanasia linked to the devaluation of human life and abortion 
An interview with bioethicist Father Gonzalo Miranda, dean of the School of Bioethics of the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, representing the Catholic Church on UNESCO's International Bioethics Committee, entrusted with writing a Declaration on Universal Norms            of Bioethics. 
September 6, 2004<br />
Zenit.org, ed.RR 
© Innovative Media, Inc

ROME ­ The Netherlands' decision to allow the euthanasia of children could lead to the practice of arbitrarily deciding which youngsters will live or die, warns a leading bioethicist. 

In response to the August 30 decision by the Dutch judiciary to allow Groningen's University Hospital to induce the death of children under 12, including newborns, when they are suffering from incurable sicknesses or undergoing unbearable suffering, Father Miranda joins in the wave of Catholic criticism. 

“Unfortunately, all the concerns that arose in regard to the Dutch legislation on euthanasia are being tragically verified," Legionary of Christ Father Gonzalo Miranda says in this interview with ZENIT. 

‘We are witnessing the negation of Judeo-Christian thought,’ says Father Miranda. ‘;In the tradition of Western thought, a person has intrinsic value by the simple fact of being a human being.’ 

‘Once a principle is established according to which a human being can be killed because he suffers, then logically it extends to all those suffering. If a human being is killed who requests it, it can be applied to all human beings who request it, even if they are not suffering. I would like to stress that it is the voluntary murder of a human being who cannot speak for himself -- the voluntary murder of a human being who cannot express what he is thinking.’ 

A 2002 law had already regulated the practice of euthanasia in the country. 

‘Despite the opposition of public opinion, just two years after that law, we are already facing its application to all the born, without any kind of informed consent by the interested party,² says Father Miranda. 

When asked by the ZENIT interviewer whether there is a link with the re-emergence of the eugenic mentality, Father Miranda responded: 

‘This eugenic mentality is already applied with the practice of abortion. If there had been a diagnosis that had discovered the sickness during the pregnancy, the child would probably never have been born. As he escaped that control, euthanasia is practiced after the birth.            It is a practice by which human beings are eliminated who are considered "not valid" -- precisely a eugenic practice of elimination of what some consider to be "defective." 

‘The first case of euthanasia was practiced on a boy who had a harelip. It occurred at the request of the parents who, fearing that he would have an unhappy life, asked the doctors of the Hitlerian regime for help; they advised euthanasia.’