Brittany Maynard Sent Email to Euthanasia Activist the Day She Died Supporting Assisted Suicide

Now a new revelation has come out about the extent to which Maynard worked with and had contact with assisted suicide activists in the time leading up to her killing herself. A new report indicates she emailed a woman who illegally provided lethal drugs to her own father that he used to take his life.

A People magazine report indicates Maynard, the day she committed suicide, sent an email to activist Barbara Mancini, who is best known for enabling her father to kill himself.

Mancini’s father Joe Yourshaw was in hospice care when he asked his daughter for a bottle of morphine. She provided the morphine to him and Yourshaw took an overdose of morphine with the intent to commit suicide. A hospice nurse called 911, and Yourshaw was revived at the hospital. He died four days later after attempts were made to save his life.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane’s office was asked to prosecute the case but it was eventually thrown out because of lack of evidence about how Yourshaw ultimately died. At the time, Michael Ciccocioppo, executive director of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, told ABC News that Yourshaw should be prosecuted it it could be proved that she broke the state’s ban on assisted suicides.

“If a person beyond a reasonable doubt committed assisted suicide, justice needs to be served and the law needs to be adjudicated,” he said then.

Compassion and Choices, whose roots can be traced back to the pro-euthanasia Hemlock Society, represented Mancini in the case and the pro-assisted suicide group pressured state Attorney General Kane to drop the case.

As People magazine indicates, Maynard and Mancini, who is now an activist seeking to legalize assisted suicide in other states, corresponded on the day she died. Maynard told Mancini in her email that she thought it was wrong that Mancini was ever charged with breaking the assisted suicide ban in Pennsylvania and giving her father the deadly drugs he used that ultimate took his life.

“I felt a connection with her on a deep level because of what my experience was, so I wrote her a short message,” Mancini said about initially emailing Maynard. “I never expected her to respond to me because her life was a whirlwind and she was dealing with a terminal illness.”

As People indicates, Mancini is now traveling the country seeking to overturn laws banning assisted suicide that protect the disabled, elderly and terminally ill patients.

The euthanasia lobby claims pain as a reason for legalizing assisted suicide, but studies show pain is not a leading factor in suicides. In Oregon, where physician-assisted suicide is legal, studies show that pain is one of the last reasons people give for committing suicide. Depression – a treatable condition – “is the only factor that significantly predicts the request for death.”

For pro-life people, the best way to help those who may consider assisted suicide is to provide mental health support for the depression and pain relief for the physical pain.

“One thing is for sure,” Ciccocioppo said. “People in pain have a right to relieve their pain, and we don’t have a problem with that. But the same Supreme Court decision … also upheld assisted suicide laws and the rights of the states to say it’s not legal. We stand by that to the end.”

“In an absolutely terminal situation, I’m not sure I see the point of it either.”

When our society was healthy - decades ago - people believed suffering could be turned toward a purpose. Maynard is an example of a society that has lost all hope. I’m not talking about hope for a cure for a particular disease. I bet Maynard believed there would be a cure for her disease sometime down the road just not in time for her. I’m talking about the kind of hope in which people believe there is a point to everything, God has a plan, providence is at work, etc. Maynard did not kill herself to avoid pain. Maynard killed herself because she saw no point to going on. That’s about purpose and hope, not pain. Despair is a terrible thing.

http://www.catholicbridge.com/catholic/why_catholics_love_suffering.php
http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/dont-waste-your-cancer

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

They say that Kansas is so flat that you can see your dog run away for a week. This is only partially true, because in Northeastern Kansas where I grew up there are lots of hills, forests, lakes and rivers. Among the hills of that region, nestled back, far away from the sounds of the city, where only meadow larks and cicadas interrupt the deafening silence of the prairie, there lies a mostly unnoticed cemetery. In the corner of that cemetery, off towards the edge where the woods begin, is the grave of a friend of mine. It reads: “Adveniat Regnum Tuum!” “Declan Brown nLC 1981 - 1995” … Declan had been one of my good friends in grade school who knew from a young age that God was calling him to the priesthood. He had visited the Legionary Apostolic School in New Hampshire where fell in love with Christ and discovered his vocation: to be a Legionary priest and save souls, bringing them to heaven.

It was a normal school morning, with an un-normal detail added to it. The Brown family didn’t show up for classes! That afternoon we found out that when Declan had woken up he couldn’t move his legs. He was rushed to the hospital in Kansas City where the doctors discovered an index finger size tumor on his spine just below the neck. The diagnosis turned out that it was a very malignant type of cancer. What made things worse though is that they couldn’t operate on it for risk that Declan would be permanently paralyzed from spinal cord damage. The doctors did what they could through radiation and chemotherapy. His condition worsened though. He offered his suffering for the souls that would be entrusted to his care as a priest. About a year later the doctors saw that the end was near, so they moved all the hospital equipment out to the Brown’s home in the country so Declan. However, about a month before he died, he asked the Legionary provincial at the time, Fr Anthony Bannon LC, if he could receive his cassock and become a legionary novice. Canonically speaking he was too young though. He was only 14 and it was necessary to be 18 years of age to form part of a religious order. So, Fr Anthony requested a special dispensation from Pope John Paul II, allowing Declan to be admitted to the novitiate. It was granted, and about a week before he died he received his cassock on that hospital bed at his home down that dusty rock road in those rolling prairie hills. He was later buried in his cassock. As his mother sat at his bedside one day, Declan said to her “Mom I’m a priest.” His mother responded “No Declan, you’re not a priest yet.” Declan insisted, “Mom I’m a priest.” She replied again “No Declan, you’re not a priest. You’ve just received the uniform to begin your training for becoming a priest.” Declan explained “Mom, Christ was a priestly victim when he was suffering on the cross. I’m suffering with Christ on cross now, so I am a priest.”

The priesthood never dawned on me at the time. I was 15.
Written by Fr. Michael Patrick Moriarty: http://www.regnumchristi.org/multimedia/interactivos/ordenaciones/eng/articulo.phtml?id=38383&se=365&ca=982&te=931

So, one teenage boy, who saw purpose in his suffering inspired another man to become a priest (by the way, there’s actually many more than just one. Many people were inspired by Declan Brown’s faith).

Now, ask yourself, what did Maynard inspire with her handling of her suffering? Suicide. That’s it. She encouraged more people to kill themselves - and some of those people won’t even be terminally ill. What a waste.

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