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Catholic here so I have the same position on euthanasia. The thing is, there is an alternative: good palliative care, which revolves around good pain management and promoting the best quality of life in the end days. The US hasn't been very good at that type of care but there are some improvements, and more and more are getting into it.

The irony, is that sometimes, someone in palliative care might live longer than someone being actively treated. Here[1] is an extreme example. Less extreme examples ocurr every day as people undergo tests and treatments which end up precipitating the general condition of the person. 70 years old and heart arteries fully blocked and only auxiliary perfusion? DON'T go get a stress test, you already know the outcome and no significant difference will be occur in treatment.

Ask any health professional how they want to die, and almost none of them will want to "do everything possible to treat". They've seen it and it sucks: doing chest compressions, thus breaking ribs of frail elders, all because their children refuse to see them let go; seeing people with tubes up every orifice and yet still in pain, away from loved ones and surrounded by strangers… no thanks!

Public Service Announcement: if you don't have any yet, make some Adcanced Directives to document what should be done to you should you become incapacitated. You can always revise them on a yearly basis.

St Robert Bellarmine wrote "The Art of Dying Well"; for non-Catholics there are other similar writings about how to live a full life without pretending that death will never happen.

[1] A terminal phase Greek cancer patient leaves NY to die in peace in his Greek island and outlives all his doctors.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/magazine/the-island-where-...