Religion and the right to (dispose of) life: A study of the attitude of Christian, Muslim and Hindu students in India concerning death penalty, euthanasia and abortion

The debate over death penalty, euthanasia and abortion reached a climax during the second half of the twentieth century. It brings into focus the underlying contrasting currents of right to life and right to dispose of life. The pluralistic Indian context in its turn can add to the ambivalent relationship between religion and the (non-)disposability of life. Hence, the question that we address in this paper concerns the role religions play in soliciting and legitimizing the (non-)disposability of life. Our empirical research, among 1215 Christian, Muslim and Hindu college students in Tamil Nadu, focuses on the possible impact of personal religious attitude, contextual religious attitude, and the value of human dignity, on the perception of right to life in the face of death penalty, euthanasia, and abortion. Overall, we find that the three religious groups manifest opposition to disposal of life by death penalty, and an uncertain openness to disposal of life by euthanasia and abortion for victim’s sake. However, as regards euthanasia, while Christians and Hindus tend to be open to disposal of life, Muslims tend to be uncertain. As regards abortion for psycho-economic reasons, the tendency among Christians is non-disposal of life and the tendency among Hindus and Muslims is an uncertain openness to disposal of life. In dealing with the complex issue of (non-)disposal of life, our findings related to personal and contextual religious attitude suggest that religions can provide a meta-ethical basis for both ‘sacredness’ and ‘quality’ human life