There was a ghost in the halls of power in New York on Monday. I’m not a big ghost person, truth be told. It wasn’t fodder for a haunting TV series. It was more like acknowledging the presence of a good man who died after putting up a good fight, running the race, and doing so with love, courage, perseverance, and clarity. J. J. Hanson used to walk the same hallways, the same grand staircases, as a spokesman for the Patient Rights Action League, and a New Yorker with brain cancer who fought against assisted suicide until he could not anymore.
Around the same time that J.J. was diagnosed, a beautiful young woman, Brittany Maynard, had the same cancer. She traveled to avail herself of assisted suicide in a state where it was legal and was celebrated by People magazine for it. The Hansons didn’t get a glossy profile, but they did get three and a half years, and they did have a second son during that time. Loving one another. “All we can do is today,” J. J.’s wife, Kristen, said in a video produced by the Patients Rights Action League shortly before J. J.’s death in late 2017 (Christmas, basically). “And we can make today the best we possibly can.”
“Try to hold onto hope,” Kris said. “For yourself. For those around you. For people you don’t even know. And it could be changing their life and you don’t even know. You can’t think of assisted suicide in one situation. You have to step back and think about who it could hurt because it puts so many people at risk.”
“If we had given up hope,” she emphasizes, “we would have missed out on so much.”
“Every moment we can share together is a gift.”
That last video of their time together will break your heart. But know that his funeral Mass was jam-packed and overflowing in a blizzard. People came from all over the state — and country. Because the Hansons loved us with their love. And gave us a mission, the one they tried to live together, until time was done.
But, now, J. J., we still need you. We Catholics talk about intercession. Can you whisper something to Governor Hochul’s guardian angel? Maybe nudge her to watch you, Kris, and your boys, and reverence your life and legacy?
Thanks be to God for the gift of life. May we always protect and nourish it.
And right here and right now in New York.