Suicide & British Politics, July 18-21, 2003

What I write I do so hestitatingly for I risk being misinterpreted and misunderstood. Yet I think what I say is worth saying.

After it was known that Dr Kelly had taken his own life last Friday, there was in the media the attributing of blame to various parties - No 10 Downing Street, the Ministry of Defence, the BBC, the Select Committee of Parliament, and so on. The Prime Minister set up immediately an official Enquiry into the reasons for the death of this scientist and civil servant.

What has struck me - amongst other things of course - is the fact that everywhere it has been taken for granted that this man had the RIGHT to take his own life. This right apparently exists when a person is under such pressures that he feels he cannot or will not bear them any longer (see E. Durkheim, Suicide, 1951, for complex motives involved in suicides).

Now I do not want to minimize the terrific pressures that this man was put under when it became known he had spoken to a journalist about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction.

What I want to say is that the Christian doctrine has long been that suicide is always wrong, whatever the motive. This said, God is the judge of why a person is driven to this extremity and he is the Compassionate One.

In this case we do not know why, we can only guess. However, what we do know is that he had duties and responsibilities as a husband and father , to his family and others. Also we can say that he had no right ( in the sense of a human right) to take his own life and thus remove himself from the duties of life that he had taken upon himself.

Finally, in all the attributing of blame, no one (whom I have heard or read) has even suggested that he alone is responsible for his action. Others certainly brought great pressures upon him. But it was he who decided to commit suicide, and who planned it with precision.

We pray that God will have mercy upon his soul and minister to his bereaved family and give the rest of us clearer perceptions of our relation to and our duty to our Maker who is also our Judge.


The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)