Thou Shalt not Kill

This past weekend I issued a new Pastoral Letter. It is about the bill before Parliament to legalise what they call ‘assisted dying’. I prefer to call it what it is: assisted suicide, helping someone to kill themselves. I urge you to read the Letter then to click on the template below and write to your MP.

“Thou Shalt not Kill” is an instinctive principle written into every human heart. It grounds the laws that govern every civilised society on earth. It is the teaching of all major religions, and it is fundamental to Christian morality and Catholic social teaching. Yet now, campaigners such as Exit International, want to change this natural law to allow killing in certain circumstances, and they are conducting an intensive campaign in the media, highlighting sad cases and making emotional pitches. Yet if we yield to this and permit killing, we will cross a line from which there is no return. Like using nuclear weapons, once deployed, it’s too late; there’s only escalation.

Let me give you four plain reasons why assisted suicide and euthanasia is wrong:
1. The option of assisted suicide would put intolerable pressure on the most vulnerable, upon the sick, the elderly, the disabled, the dying.
2. To legalise assisted suicide would completely undermine palliative care and the work of care-homes and could spell the end of hospices.
3. Assisted suicide would place an unacceptable and immoral demand on medical staff, expecting them to become accessories to killing.
4. If the legislation is passed, even with the strictest limits for now, the thresholds of eligibility will keep creeping forward to cover ever more categories of persons.

You can watch a video of the Pastoral Letter by clicking on the picture or you can read it here in full. The template letter to send to your MP is available here.

You can continue to read this issue in full here.