Whether it’s to protect consciences or vulnerable patients, the best hope for limiting the scope of assisted suicide in Canada now is a “robust third party option for all end-of-life care issues,” said Sr. Nuala Kenny as Bill C-14 wended its way from the House of Commons and through the Senate.

Autonomy has evolved into a word of frightful power. Its meaning now goes beyond such independent actions as choosing a spouse, following a career path or adopting a style of fashion. It surpasses political views and for many has become a one-word mantra for a new religion called secularism, in which God is replaced by putting “me” at the centre of the universe. 

With no law in place to govern assisted suicide, physicians and vulnerable patients face uncertainty, confusion and more opinions than facts.

OTTAWA – Canada awoke to a new dawn of assisted suicide on June 7 as a Supreme Court deadline passed and government legislation to legalize doctor-assisted death was stuck in the Senate.

Somewhere in California on Thursday, June 9, a gravely ill person may lift a glass and drink a lethal slurry of pulverized prescription pills dissolved in water.

TORONTO – Anti-euthanasia activist Alex Schadenberg has been honoured with the Archbishop Adam Exner Award for Catholic Excellence in Public Life by the Catholic Civil Rights League for his ongoing advocacy against euthanasia and assisted suicide.

In the government’s rush to push Bill C-14, the medically assisted dying legislation, through the House of Commons, Canadians have been left very much on the sidelines. 

OTTAWA – Hundreds of people gathered on Parliament Hill to protest against euthanasia June 1, the day after Parliament passed Bill C-14 to legalize the practice and sent it on to the Senate for royal assent.

OTTAWA – The Liberal government's assisted suicide legislation, which Canada's bishops describe as "fundamentally unjust" and an "affront to human dignity," easily passed third and final reading in the House of Commons May 31 and was sent to the Senate for final approval.

OTTAWA – A coalition representing vulnerable Canadians believes the lives of the disabled will be at risk due to a looming legal vacuum caused by the probable failure of the government’s assisted suicide Bill C-14 to be enacted by June 6.

OTTAWA – With the June 6 deadline fast approaching for the federal government to come up with a law around assisted suicide, Canada’s Catholic Primate has issued a challenge to all people of good will who know someone reaching the end stages of life.

Just when you thought the slide into assisted suicide couldn’t get worse, the Prime Minister elbowed into the fray to underscore, once again, the madness of Parliament’s dizzy sprint to pass a new law as if MPs were working on a 30-minute deadline to deliver a pizza.

It is all but impossible to discuss the multi-dimensional aspects of assisted suicide and euthanasia without a discussion of suffering. Suffering is the underlying factor around which the discussion on euthanasia ultimately takes place.

OTTAWA – A Senate committee has recommended that the government amend its controversial assisted-suicide bill to limit access to the terminally ill and to imbed conscience rights for institutions and health workers before the legislation is put to a vote in Parliament.

It’s a question that elicits conflicting opinions from constitutional lawyers who oppose euthanasia and assisted-suicide. They are divided on whether passing Bill C-14 without further amendments is preferable to no bill at all. The Supreme Court has given the government until June 6 to pass a law.