Suicide

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philosophizer

philosophizer

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I'm just finishing this book so this quote was fresh in my mind on this subject. It's from Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton. Forgive me if it's long.

from Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton
Grave moderns told us that we must not even say "poor fellow," of a man who had blown his brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is different from other crimes -- for it makes even crimes impossible.
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I liked this section because I had never really thought of it from that perspective. There is so much in the world to love. All of God's creation is out there for us to live with and in and among. True, all of man's sin is also out there. But a person who is ready to give up on life because of the tragedy of sin is ready to turn their back on all of God's expressed goodness. They are missing the faith that all that is good in the world can overcome all that is bad. They are ready to give up all God has given to the human race in order to escape the hardships of sin.

Chesterton then goes on to compare suicide to martyrdom in a really inventive way.

from Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton
About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the universe. And then I remembered the stake and the cross-roads, and the queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the crossroads to show what Christianity thought of the pessimist.
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SOTK

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I realize this is an old thread and you are feeling better, which I am glad for, but I wanted to share a little something. I suffered from depression once upon a time. It was when I was drinking. I contemplated suicide a few times. Someone once shared something with me about this. It sounds a little corny but there is a lot of truth to it. This person said, "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem". When I began to think about it this way, I realized the absolute logic of it. Feelings, most circumstances, and thoughts are almost always temporary. They go away. They almost always get better. Life is long. It's a long time when compared to thoughts and feelings that are occuring in the now. This means that I have a lot of time for things to get better....a lot of life to live....a lot of, probably, good things to experience. Suicide, on the other hand, is permanent. Also, it's an extremely selfish and ungodly act. When I thought of the whole temporay-permanent thing, I began to see how illogical I was thinking and how my feelings were going to change eventually. When my thought process kicked in, I was able to start thinking about how selfish the act of suicide was and how God didn't want that for me. In fact, I realized I hadn't been thinking about God at all. That was a big part of the problem. THis whole process of thinking brought me completely out of my depression and got me focused back onto God.

I hope some of that helps!

In CHrist,

SOTK
 
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AtheistsAreGod

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Jeez, all you christians are either suicidal or bi-polar! Not much of an advert for your belief system!
PS> Really, next time someone says they're suicidal, don't bother with this 'ooh lets say prayers' malarchy unless you want to tip them over the edge!
 
Wamba

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Originally posted by AtheistsAreGod

Jeez, all you christians are either suicidal or bi-polar! Not much of an advert for your belief system!
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All? Do you actually belive that? I really doubt it.

PS> Really, next time someone says they're suicidal, don't bother with this 'ooh lets say prayers' malarchy unless you want to tip them over the edge!
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:rolleyes: Why do you keep trying to sneak in, Jackielabby?! Why?
 
Lighthouse

Lighthouse

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Wamba-
It can't be Jackie. This guy registered in January, and Jackie just got banned a few days ago.
 
Lighthouse

Lighthouse

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Well, it's possible, but I don't see why Jackie would register a second name, before getting banned.
 
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newbietoJC

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I know what you mean, wantsdirection... I almost killed myself like a month ago... but praise God I didnt... or would have never have got to known Jesus.
 
Lighthouse

Lighthouse

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Well, I've already told you she doesn't post here anymore. But she's also no longer suicidal.
 
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