The human person is defined as being-towards-death (Sein zum Tode). The life of a man is situated on the confrontation with death, the last gateway from his living on the earth. Terminally ill patients moving towards death might waste last moments of ...
The human person is defined as being-towards-death (Sein zum Tode). The life of a man is situated on the confrontation with death, the last gateway from his living on the earth. Terminally ill patients moving towards death might waste last moments of their life on desperation generated from indescribable fear and dread, never experienced. Therefore, preparation for facing with death is needed by all of us and in particular, caring for patients’ deathbed should be reconsidered. At this point, it is proposed that ‘the vocation to care for terminal patients’ be taken into consideration. This vocation is manifested at the moment in which one is induced to see the being-in-itself of terminally ill patients. It is necessary for helpers to search for feasible and pratical ways of care for patients who resting in a terrifying agony, cry for help. Christians also are invited to care for patients, care that could be singularly performed in the faith.
The pain and suffering of terminally ill patients do not require to be cured and healed just on the physical level. The care needed for terminal patients might be accomplished in the place where they can go towards death, accepting their own difficult situations, concluding their own life in a proper way, and maintaining their dignity. For all of these, someone willing to accompany the patients is necessarily called. From the Christian point of view, pain and suffering can be identified with a salvific experience, and with a reality that manifests itself in relation to God. This experience refers also to an imminent advent of liberation issued from pain and suffering. It does not mean refuge ‘from’ pain and suffering, but freedom and liberation ‘through’ pain and suffering: pain and suffering are not a kind of punishment, but a salvific moment in which human being is urged to reform himself, and invited to conversion by virtue of a dynamism of love. They cannot be reduced to ironic incident, because they lead humans to encounter and to recognize the meaning of life, in the center of which the Word of salvation as gift is found.
For terminally ill patients who undergo ‘total pain’, it is necessary to perform so-called ‘total care’. Terminal patients cannot be considered as ‘object’ of care on the ground that the relationship between patient and helper should not be defined as unilateral, that is, as that of recipient-offerer, but be performed bilaterally just like interpersonal communication of donor-donee: in this interpersonal communicative action of care, every persons involved are equal and complementary.
In conclusion, we should affirm that in the interpersonal action of care, terminally ill patient as person is manifested as ‘subject’ who engages himself in relationship with various helpers. Terminal patient and helper, both of them are being that cannot live without love, and that can fully realize himself by way of love, which is self-giving. In the interpersonal relationship between terminal patient and helper, the hope revealed in the Love which is put into action by way of the Passion and Death of Christ, is narrated and demonstrated: giving himself to a patient by means of various acts of love, helper proclaims to the patient the Love of Jesus who heals the sick and raises the dead; participating in the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ by going through his own pain and suffering, terminally ill patient shows the truth of human person to those that help him. The relationship between terminal patient and helper, founded on the action of love, contributes effectually to giving witness to the Presence and Love of God, which in their turn, drive patient and helper to carry through the vocation of love.