No Reason For Living!

Life is the first gift received and we spend the rest of our lives thanking God or at least we should. "I give you thanks that I am fearfully, wonderfully made; wonderful are your works" (Ps. 139:14).

Sadly many are the  reasons we fail to see this preciousness and in Korea much of society is concerned because of the large number who have lost the reason for living and die by their own hands. Society knows the cost this has on many families. Programs, education and many efforts are expended to decrease the number of suicides within the country.

In the Catholic Peace Weekly a religious sister who is the director of a suicide prevention program writes an article on what to do when persons don't find a reasons for living. How do we help those who are thinking of suicide? Am I able to help those who are contemplating suicide?

These are the kinds of questions that she hears often in her work. Suicide is the worst possible result of a problem that has many and varied reasons. However, there are ways to prevent this from happening she makes clear. There is a unique counter measure for  the problem.

When we discover signs of this possibility we need to take action and use what we learned with Gatekeeper Training for Suicide prevention and get involved. However much learned, it is of little value if we don't apply it.

In the situation of those who are thinking of suicide among the many different emotions they have one that is similar in all cases: a feeling of hopelessness. They have not found a reason for living. Not that there is no meaning for living but they have not found it. When a person has a reason for living he is able to overcome all difficulties.

When a person has lost all reason for living,  paradoxically, they are in position to find a reason for living. In the situation they are in they don't have the strength to do this and the reason they need someone to help them. That is where we need to enter and help them to find reasons for living.

Suicide is a choice and in Korea we continue to find ways to help those whose pain either physical, emotional or mental is so severe that nothing makes any sense and they choose death. The family suffers and all those who knew the person suffer so in life we need to be more concerned in making every person we meet our eternal responsibility. In every thing we say and do, to show not only the  preciousness of our own life but the lives of all those we meet.