How is that we think of responsibility? On Thursday, more than two dozen persons spoke to three members of the Sackler family via video regarding the pain and heartbreak their families experienced because of addiction to OxyContin, the opioid produced by PurduePharma and prescribed to millions to relieve pain.
It was part of the $6 billion settlement $641 million of which will come to New Jersey for treatment programs. The Sacklers have declared they are not responsible for addiction to the pain-killing drug that has caused so much suffering.
The wife of my son’s best childhood friend became addicted after she used the drug for pain control following a fall from a ladder. It drove her into a deep depression and one day she decided to end it all. And she did. Who was responsible there? How do we draw a line from a drug supposedly prescribed to help people that ended up killing not just her but many more? How do we measure responsibility?
Prayer for the Day
We pray, O God, to take the pain we experience away from us.
But we now ask what was the cost of the medications;
Pain, we know, O Lord, comes in so many forms, so many ways,
And none of us wants to live with pain that can debilitate us.
Grant us healing from what pain can make us become,
And be with us in our journeys as we seek redemption.
In the name of the one who redeems us with love,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
A nation is formed by the willingness by the willingness of each of us to share in the responsibility in upholding the common good.
- Barbara Jordan, Member of Congress (1936-1996)
Pain is always accompanied by emotion and meaning so that each pain is unique to the individual. The word pain is used to group together a class of combined emotional sensory events.. each of which is a personal individual experience.
- Patrick Wall, from Pain: The Science of Suffering
My God, m God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?
O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer;
And by night, but find no rest.
Psalm 22: 1-2