Category: News Releases

Quebec Commission on Dying with Dignity Releases Death with Dignity Report

 Improvements to hospice palliative care recommended

NEWS RELEASE

Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association

April 2, 2012 (Ottawa, ON) – The Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association (CHPCA) is optimistic about many of the recommendations put forth in the Special Commission on Dying with Dignity’s (Commission spéciale sur la question de mourir dans la dignité) report, Dying with Dignity. On March 22, the Committee made 24 recommendations to the Minister of Health and Social Services as to how end-of-life care should be improved in Quebec. Among the recommendations, the CHPCA applauds those focused on the further development of hospice palliative care in Quebec; these include improved training for hospice palliative care professionals, earlier access to hospice palliative care for patients, and the implementation of end-of-life care policy in Quebec.

The CHPCA commends the Committee for their efforts and inclusion of recommendations around improving the quality and delivery of hospice palliative care in Quebec. The Commission conducted extensive hearings with hospice palliative care professionals across Quebec to ensure that all viewpoints were equally represented. The resulting report is a strong first step towards implementing standardized hospice palliative care in Quebec so that all patients may have the highest quality of life and quality of dying

Among the recommendations however, were several advocating for the legalization of physician assisted death**, should the patient request. “Many of the Committee’s recommendations show a positive future for hospice palliative care in Quebec,” stated Sharon Baxter, Executive Director of the CHPCA, “however we need to have a clear distinction between hospice palliative care and physician assisted death. Physician assisted death should not be considered a part of or linked to hospice palliative care ideology or practice.”

“. . .Physician assisted death should not be considered a part of or linked to hospice palliative care ideology or practice.”  . . . Should a legislation allowing physician assisted death be passed by the Quebec government in the future, the dedicated and committed personnel who work in hospice palliative care should not be expected to participate in this practice.

The CHPCA believes that hospice palliative care is about ensuring a good death for all Canadians through an interdisciplinary approach that includes pain and symptom management, psychological support, spiritual care, bereavement care, and much more to address the suffering of patients and their families.

Should a legislation allowing physician assisted death be passed by the Quebec government in the future, the dedicated and committed personnel who work in hospice palliative care should not be expected to participate in this practice.

Right now, only 16% of Canadians who die have access to or receive hospice palliative, and quality end-of-life care services. The CHPCA wants to ensure that all Canadians have the highest quality of life as they live with a life limiting or terminal illness. Too many Canadians die with suffering that could be addressed in a more effective manner. The CHPCA believes that we need to have a greater focus on quality end of life care and the right to high quality hospice palliative care at the end of life for all Canadians as we enter into the debate around the contentious issue of physician assisted death.

**incorporates both terms “euthanasia” and “assisted suicide”

-30-

For further information, please contact:

Vanessa Sherry Communications Officer Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association E-mail: vsherry@bruyere.org Phone: 613-241-3663 ext: 229

The Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association — the national voice for hospice palliative care in Canada – is dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in care for persons approaching death so that the burdens of suffering, loneliness and grief are lessened. The CHPCA operates in close partnership with other national organizations and continues to work to ensure that all Canadians, regardless of where they may live, have equal access to quality hospice palliative care services for themselves and their family.

Bishops promise to continue ‘vigorous efforts’ against HHS violations of religious freedom in health care reform mandate

Declare government has no place defining religion, religious ministry

Seek protection for conscience rights of institutions, individuals

Stress action with the public, White House, Congress, courts

NEWS RELEASE

US Conference of Catholic Bishops

WASHINGTON—The U.S. bishops are strongly united in their ongoing and determined  efforts to protect religious freedom, the Administrative Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) said in a March 14 statement.

The Administrative Committee, chaired by Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, president of the USCCB, is the highest authority of the bishops’ conference outside the semi-annual sessions of the full body of bishops. The Committee’s membership consists of the elected chairmen of all the USCCB permanent committees and an elected bishop representative from each of the geographic regions of the USCCB.

[Full statement]

The Administrative Committee said it was “strongly unified and intensely focused in its opposition to the various threats to religious freedom in our day.” The bishops will continue their vigorous work of education on religious freedom, dialogue with the executive branch, legislative initiatives and efforts in the courts to defend religious freedom. They promised a longer statement on the principles at the heart of religious freedom, which will come later from the bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Religious Liberty.

The bishops noted that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate that forces all private health plans to provide coverage of sterilization and contraceptives – including abortion-inducing drugs – called for an immediate response. Of particular concern, they said, are a religious exemption from the mandate that the bishops deem “arbitrarily narrow” and an “unspecified and dubious future ‘accommodation’’’ offered to other religious organizations that are denied the exemption.

The bishops thanked supporters from the Catholic community and beyond “who have stood firmly with us in our vigorous opposition to this unjust and illegal mandate.”

“It is your enthusiastic unity in defense of religious freedom that has made such a dramatic and positive impact in this historic public debate.”

The bishops said this dispute is not about access to contraceptives but about the government’s forcing the Church to provide them. Their concerns are not just for the Catholic Church but also for “those who recognize that their cherished beliefs may be next on the block.”

“Indeed, this is not about the Church wanting to force anybody to do anything; it is instead about the federal government forcing the Church – consisting of its faithful and all but a few of its institutions – to act against Church teachings,” they said.

The Church has worked for universal healthcare in the United States since 1919, they added, and said the current issue “is not a Republican or Democratic, a conservative or liberal issue; it is an American issue.”

The bishops called the HHS mandate “an unwarranted government definition of religion,” with government deciding who is a religious employer deserving exemption from the law.

“The introduction of this unprecedented defining of faith communities and their ministries has precipitated this struggle for religious freedom,” the bishops said.

“Government has no place defining religion and religious ministry,” they said.

“If this definition is allowed to stand, it will spread throughout federal law, weakening its healthy tradition of generous respect for religious freedom and diversity,” they said.

The bishops said the government’s foray into church governance “where government has no legal competence or authority” is beyond disturbing. Those deemed by HHS not to be “religious employers,” the bishops said, “will be forced by government to violate their own teachings within their very own institutions. This is not only an injustice in itself, but it also undermines the effective proclamation of those teachings to the faithful and to the world.”

The bishops also called the HHS mandate “a violation of personal civil rights.”  The new mandate creates a class of people “with no conscience protection at all: individuals who, in their daily lives, strive constantly to live in accordance with their faith and values,” the bishops said. “They too face a government mandate to aid in providing ‘services’ contrary to those values – whether in their sponsoring of, and payment for, insurance as employers; their payment of insurance premiums as employees, or as insurers themselves – without even the semblance of exemptions.”

The bishops called for the Catholic faithful, and all people of good will throughout the nation to join them in prayer and penance “for our leaders and for the complete protection of our First Freedom – religious liberty.”

“Prayer is the ultimate source of our strength,” the bishops said, “for without God we can do nothing. But with God all things are possible.”

Contact Sr. Mary Ann Walsh

Statement by Glasgow midwives after abortion judgment

NEWS RELEASE
29 February 2012, 17:15

Society for the Protection of Unborn Children

The two Glasgow midwives at the centre of today’s court judgment on conscientious objection to abortion have made the following statement:

Miss Mary Doogan said:

“Connie [Wood] and I are both very disappointed and greatly saddened by today’s verdict.

“For most of our 20-plus years of employment as midwifery sisters at the Southern General Hospital we have been proud to be associated with a maternity unit in which the right of all midwifery staff to freedom of conscience has been acknowledged, protected and upheld with no detrimental outcome to any mother whatsoever.

“Neither Connie nor I stand in judgement of any woman who chooses to terminate her pregnancy for whatever reasons. We are more than aware of the difficult choices that some expectant mothers may be faced with in a crisis pregnancy.

“However, in holding to the view that life should be protected from conception to natural death, neither do we wish to be judged for exercising what is our legal right to refuse to participate in the process of medical termination of pregnancy.

“We wish now to take some time to consider all options that are available to us (including appeal) before making any further comment.”

Notes for editors:

Since both women remain employees of the health board they are not in a position to make further comment or give interviews.

The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) has supported the midwives in bringing their case, underwriting their legal costs, and will now be considering their further legal options with them. Please see SPUC’s release of earlier today  and of 17 January.SPUC’s communications department can be contacted on:

  • mobile: 07939 177683
  • direct dial: 020 7820 3129
  • email: news@spuc.org.uk
  • Twitter: @spucprolife

Ave Maria University files federal suit to protect religious identity

NEWS RELEASE

Ave Maria University

NAPLES, FL (February 21, 2012) –Jim Towey, Ave Maria University President announced today that the University is seeking declaratory and injunctive relief from a federal court in Florida, because the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services demands the University offer health plan services that undermine its firmly-held religious convictions.

“The federal government has no right to coerce the University into funding contraceptive services that include abortion-inducing drugs and sterilization, in the health plan we offer our employees,” said Towey. “Under the federal mandate Ave Maria University would be paying for these drugs if we complied with the law. So we will not. We are prepared to discontinue our health plan and pay the $2,000 per employee, per year fine rather than comply with an unjust, immoral mandate in violation of our rights of conscience.”

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed suit this morning on behalf of the University.

“The federal mandate puts Ave Maria in a terrible bind,” said Kyle Duncan, General Counsel for the Becket Fund. “Either it betrays its faith and covers the drugs, or else it ends employee health benefits and pays hundreds of thousands in annual fines.”

Towey, former head of the Bush Administration’s Faith-Based and Community Initiatives is determined to stop the Administration’s assault on religious freedom. “Allowing a U.S. president of any political party or spiritual belief to force conformance to his or her religious or secular orthodoxy through executive action, is a perilous precedent,” said Towey. “I hope all of my colleagues in academia, including Catholic higher education, awaken to this danger.”

Ave Maria University’s case is the fourth lawsuit brought by the Becket Fund challenging the Obama administration’s abortion drug mandate. The Becket Fund also represents Belmont Abbey College (a Catholic college in North Carolina), Colorado Christian University (a nondenominational Christian University outside Denver), and the Eternal Word Television Network.

ADF, Louisiana College challenge Obama mandate

NEWS RELEASE

Alliance Defence  Fund

ALEXANDRIA, La. — Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Louisiana College Saturday against the Obama administration. The lawsuit challenges the administration’s unconstitutional mandate that religious employers provide abortifacients, sterilization, and contraception at no cost to employees regardless of religious or moral objections.

“People of faith shouldn’t be punished by the government for following their beliefs when making decisions for themselves or their organizations,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “The Obama administration invented a fake ‘right’ to get ‘free’ abortion pills and sterilization and elevated it above real freedoms protected by the First Amendment. This calculated and intentional attempt to eradicate constitutional protections should terrify every freedom-loving American.”

“The Obama administration has purposely transformed a non-existent problem–access to contraception–into a constitutional crisis,” said ADF-allied attorney and co-counsel Mike Johnson, dean of Louisiana College’s Pressler School of Law. “This mandate offers no choice; Americans either comply and abandon their convictions or resist and be punished.”

Attorney sound bites: Kevin Theriot | Mike Johnson

President Obama held a press conference on Feb. 10 to offer a “compromise” under which some religious non-profit organizations would not have to comply with the mandate. Instead, the employer’s insurer would be required to offer the employer’s employees the same coverage at no charge. The “compromise,” however, does not exist in the rules or guidance Obama issued on Feb. 10, and the administration is not required to formally propose it.

Theriot explained that even if the proposed change did exist and had coherent boundaries, it would still require the employer to facilitate coverage by providing and paying for an objectionable plan, the costs of which would be passed on to the employers and/or employees via premiums.

“The time for silence is over,” said Louisiana College President Dr. Joe W. Aguillard. “Louisiana College will not sit by and allow this or any government to usurp our God-given religious freedoms and our time-honored Baptist heritage.”

The new lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, Louisiana College v. Sebelius, argues that the mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act as well as the First and Fifth amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

  • Pronunciation guide: Theriot (TAIR’-ee-oh)
ADF is a legal alliance of Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations defending the right of people to freely live out their faith. Launched in 1994, ADF employs a unique combination of strategy, training, funding, and litigation to protect and preserve religious liberty, the sanctity of life, marriage, and the family.