Category: News

llinois Judge Suspends Abortion Notification Law

Measure forces pregnancy centers to promote abortion

Church Militant

Stephen Wynne

ROCKFORD, Ill. (ChurchMilitant.com) – In a setback for mandatory abortion referral laws, a federal judge is halting implementation of an Illinois notification measure.

U.S. District Court Judge Frederick Kapala has temporarily suspended enforcement of SB1564, a measure that compels pro-life pregnancy care centers and doctors to publicize abortion to their clients. In his ruling, Kapala warned that SB1564, an amendment to the Illinois Healthcare Right of Conscience Act, may threaten religious liberty and free speech rights.

SB1564 went into effect January 1. In response, the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates joined with 18 Illinois pregnancy care centers to challenge it in court. . . [Full text]

 

Vatican threatens Belgian order allowing euthanasia

La Croix

Malo Tresca

A brusque reversal by the Belgian province of the Order of the Brothers of Charity  has led to a lively polemic.

The order has previously always refused to practice euthanasia, which has been legal in Belgium for nearly fifteen years.

But in a document addressed to hospital management and staff of its fifteen psychiatric centers, the Belgium Brothers of Charity in March confirmed its decision to finally authorize medically assisted death, including for its patients who were “in a non-terminal situation”.

No explanation of the reasons for the change

This surprising about face by a Catholic congregation attracted the fire of the Belgian Bishops Conference, the Vatican and the hierarchy of the Order. . . [Full text]

 

 

 

Ontario doctors fight law forcing them to help kill their patients

The Interim

Five doctors and three doctors’ groups were in an Ontario court June 13-15 arguing a policy from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) violates their Charter rights to freedom of conscience and religion. The CPSO forces doctors to refer patients for euthanasia and abortion, even when it violates their conscience or religion. Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal government intervened on behalf of the college.

The 2015 CPSO policy requires that doctors who object on religious or conscience grounds to providing certain procedures such as abortion and euthanasia must give patients seeking these practices an effective referral. This means directly handing over a patient to another colleague who will follow through with an abortion or euthanasia request. The doctors argue this implicates them in the immoral practices to which they object. . . . [Full text]

 

116 Victorian patients refuse lifesaving treatment

The Advertiser

Grant McAurthur

FOUR Victorians a week are taking legal action to prevent doctors giving them lifesaving treatment, with the number expected to multiply next year when new regulations make refusing care easier.

As the Victorian parliament prepares to debate voluntary euthanasia laws in coming months, the Herald Sun can reveal 116 patients have already used legally binding certificates to ban hospitals prolonging their lives this year; however, the measures stop short of assisting them to die.

The issue arose last month when a failed suicide pact saw emergency doctors at Monash Medical Centre forced to save an elderly patient against her wishes because no legally binding Refusal of Treatment Certificate had been lodged to reinforce the demands. . . [Full text]

 

Assisted killing still part of Ontario’s palliative care plan

Catholic Register

Michael Swan

The agency responsible for expanding Ontario’s network of hospice care wants hospice patients to have the option of assisted suicide, even if most hospices and the majority of doctors oppose it.

“The OPCN (Ontario Palliative Care Network) promotes early and equitable access to hospice palliative care for all patients with a life-limiting illness, including individuals who have requested medical assistance in dying,” a spokesperson for the Ontario Palliative Care Network told The Catholic Register in an email.

The provincially-funded OPCN, a sub-agency of Cancer Care Ontario, “recognizes that there may be an intersection between palliative care and medical assistance in dying (MAID). Both medical assistance in dying and palliative care are health care services that exist within the health care system,” wrote Cancer Care Ontario communications advisor Jayani Perera. “However, the focus and mandate of the Ontario Palliative Care Network is advancing palliative care in the province.”

A year into legalized killing in Canada, the big question is how palliative care and hospice beds will be expanded, said bioethicist Bob Parke. Will governments fund hospices that refuse to perform or refer for assisted dying? . . [Full text]