Category: Religion

Bill Undermines Conscientious Objection to VAD

CQ Today

Duncan Evans

Conscientious objection to voluntary assisted dying (VAD) may not be an option for Queenslanders if the state government’s bill to legalise VAD is passed in its present form, a leading healthcare provider has warned.

In a media statement released last week, Mater Board Chair Francis Sullivan AO said the proposed legislation would force Mater to allow assisted dying to take place at its facilities in direct contradiction to the moral ethos upon which the healthcare provider delivers patient care to Queenslanders.

“The proposed law will also compel Mater and other not-for-profit providers to allow doctors who are not known to our hospitals to enter our facilities to administer lethal doses to our patients,” Mr Sullivan said. . . . continue reading

COVID Vaccination and Conscience Debate Intensifies

Amid a spike of cases and concerns about the Delta variant, some U.S. bishops oppose a religious exemption, yet ethics experts caution against mandates.

National Catholic Register

Judy Roberts

An increase in COVID-19 cases sparked by the Delta variant has sharpened the divide among Catholics in the United States over whether individuals should be required to inoculate against the coronavirus or have the right in conscience to decline the currently available vaccines.   

Amid a wave of new vaccine mandates being rolled out by businesses and institutions in response to the spike, Catholics who morally object to the vaccines are finding themselves at odds with those who think the ethical obligation to protect public health should be the foremost consideration.  . . continue reading

Manitoba medical student expelled over ‘pro-gun and pro-life’ Facebook posts wins court ruling

Rafael Zaki said he was expelled for his conscientious and religious beliefs. The judge said the university appeared biased in its decision

The National Post

Tyler Dawson

A Manitoba medical student who was expelled after failing to satisfactorily apologize for his controversial views on guns and abortion has been granted a new adjudication of his expulsion.

Rafael Zaki, a Coptic Orthodox student at the University of Manitoba who was supposed to graduate in 2022, posted three items on his Facebook page in February 2019. He was expelled in August 2019

One year later, after losing two appeals within the university system, Zaki asked Manitoba’s Court of Queen’s Bench to review the decision made by the University Discipline Committee. Zaki said he was expelled “for holding conscientious and religious beliefs that abortion is harmful.” . . . continue reading

Ruling blocking HHS ‘transgender mandate’ called ‘victory for conscience’

Catholic Review

CNA Staff

WASHINGTON (CNS) — A U.S. District Court judge’s Aug. 9 ruling to block the Biden administration’s mandate that doctors and hospitals perform gender-transition procedures despite their own moral or medical objections is “a victory for common sense, conscience and sound medicine.”

That is the view of Luke Goodrich, vice president and senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, based in Washington. He is the lead counsel for the plaintiffs in the case.

“Today’s ruling protects patients, aligns with current medical research, and ensures doctors aren’t forced to violate their religious beliefs and medical judgment,” he said about the ruling in Franciscan Alliance v. Becerra. . . continue reading

Spanish win the right to medically assisted death

New Frame

Alex Čizmić, Ricard Gonzalez

Carme Barahona wears a smile that is only erased when she recalls how her son Ivan Martí died in late 2017. “He sent me a message saying: ‘Thanks for taking care of me, mom. I am going to rest’.” 

Marti, 43, had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, an incurable neurodegenerative disease that results in a progressive loss of movement and eventually death. Right after receiving her son’s farewell message, Barahona made sure to clock in at her job to prove she had not helped him take his life. Otherwise, she might have been imprisoned. 

Since 25 June, however, this risk no longer exists. Spain has legislated that its citizens who suffer from a “chronic and incurable disease, with an unbearable physical or mental suffering” have the right to ask for medical assistance to die. . . continue reading