As France prepares for a final vote on assisted suicide legislation 24 February, the French bishops’ conference has called for a nationwide day of prayer and fasting 20 February, urging Catholics to reflect on what it calls the grave moral stakes of the proposal.
The debate unfolds as euthanasia cases climb worldwide. In Spain, official figures show 426 state-approved assisted deaths in 2021, a sharp rise since legalisation.
Benigno Blanco of the Spanish Forum on the Family warns that euthanasia is becoming “normalised,” published like any other health statistic.
In Australia, where assisted dying began in Victoria and expanded nationwide, more than 1,000 people died using voluntary assisted dying in New South Wales last year.
Bioethicist Xavier Symons cautions that medicine risks shifting from healing to service provision. Symons warned lawmakers in other countries debating euthanasia may underestimate how eligibility criteria can expand over time.
“The biggest risk is establishing a ‘right to die’ that could expand well beyond terminal illness, essentially allowing access to euthanasia for every group that desires it,” he said.
“This includes people with mental illness, people with chronic illness, and even people who are tired of life. If you say that some people have a right to euthanasia, it is difficult to block the conclusion that all people have a right to euthanasia.”
Catholic leaders in France, Australia and the UK argue true dignity lies in palliative care, not hastened death, and warn that legalization reshapes culture – and families – in lasting ways.
