The president of the Catholic Union urged opponents of the legalisation of assisted suicide to write to their MPs about their personal experience and concerns.
Addressing the Catholic Union’s annual general meeting on 15 October, Baroness Hollins said there were many new MPs debating Kim Leadbeater’s bill who should be in “listening mode” to their constituents, who should “ensure that all unintended consequences are exposed, explored and considered”.
Sheila Hollins, a former president of the Royal College of Occupational Therapists, warned of faults in any legislation. “We don’t normally legislate for ‘it’s my choice’,” she said. “I don’t think you can legislate for love.”
She referred to research in the Netherlands revealing that a significant number of people who died by euthanasia displayed symptoms of intellectual disability and autism. It was, she said, “perceived as unbearable to be a disabled person”.
Bishop John Sherrington, an auxiliary in the Diocese of Westminster and the lead on life issues for the bishops of England and Wales, told the meeting there were “many different prongs” to the campaign to legalise assisted dying.
He emphasised the Church’s support for palliative care and the need for better provision across the UK. Maggie Doherty, the director the Centre of the Art of Living and Dying Well at St Mary’s University, called for a national strategy to promote “death literacy” in her keynote address to the meeting.
“We as a nation need to get better at talking about life and about death,” she said.
The leader of the Irish Church said last week that all efforts to introduce assisted suicide “should be strongly opposed”.
Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh said medical and healthcare professionals were “gravely concerned” at political initiatives which would interfere with their calling to “do no harm”, including the bill before Westminster and the final report of the Joint Committee on Assisted Dying before the Dáil.
“As a society we are defined by the extent to which we care for our most vulnerable persons including those suffering from disabilities, terminal illness or nearing the end of life,” he said.
After the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby warned that Ms Leadbeater’s bill would lead to a “slippery slope”, she proposed a meeting to discuss legislation, emphasising the need to avoid “discord and division” in the debate.
On Tuesday, the Anglican Bishop of London Sarah Mullally wrote to the clergy of her diocese, warning that a “change in legislation will risk an increasing number of people seeing themselves as a burden”.
“The debate on assisted suicide is an important debate to have,” said Mullally, a former chief nursing officer. “But we are a long way from being ready for a fully informed debate and even further from being equipped to decide on a change in legislation.”
Preaching at a Mass for the 150th anniversary of Corpus Christi Maiden Lane in Covent Garden, the Archbishop of Westminster Cardinal Vincent Nichols again addressed the debate, urging Christians to “make a special effort to beseech the Lord to protect our society from an impoverished view of life merely as a personal project, rather than a wondrous gift of God”.
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