THORNHILL, ONT. – A suburban Toronto parish community is not sitting idly by as assisted suicide makes its way to becoming the law of the land.

TORONTO – One of Canada’s two members of the Pontifical Academy for Life – a leading bioethicist and major researcher into disability issues – is urging Catholics to engage legislators to minimize the damage of the new assisted suicide law.

OTTAWA – Catholic, Protestant, Jewish and Muslim faith leaders have joined together to appeal for the protection of conscience rights for health professionals and institutions in Canada’s new assisted-death bill.

OTTAWA – Canadians Catholic bishops, Catholic organizations and pro-life groups are concerned about the Liberal government’s assisted suicide Bill C-14, especially given the tragedy at Attawapiskat.

It is not right to make fun of someone’s writing. I fear the critical boomerang may come back and slap me in the face.

OTTAWA – Pro-life organizations have condemned Bill C-14 that will legalizing “medical assistance in dying,” calling it “dangerous.”

OTTAWA – The federal government introduced legislation April 14 to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide for competent adults with grievous medical conditions.

OTTAWA – Euthanasia and assisted suicide advocates may end up getting more than they bargained for when they reach their waning days, said a doctor with Canadian Physicians for Life.

EDMONTON – The spectre of assisted suicide is leading aging people to "fear an institution that should be the last thing they should ever fear — a hospital," said Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith.

If the Supreme Court of Canada says Canadians have a right to a doctor’s help in committing suicide, Ottawa South MPP John Fraser says we also have a right to timely access to quality palliative care.

OTTAWA — Canada’s Catholic bishops are glad to count Pope Francis as an ally in their fight against euthanasia. The bishops were anxious to point out how strong the Pope rejects euthanasia in his post-synodal exhortation Amoris Laetita: On Love in the Family, Apr. 8, noting in its teachings its rejection of euthanasia.

The Supreme Court ruling that legalized assisted suicide last year didn’t just find a technical problem in the wording of the Criminal Code. It said that Canadians have a right to ask for and receive state-sanctioned aid in killing themselves under certain circumstances.

TORONTO - Catholic bishops, anti-euthanasia activists and doctors all know they’re not going to get what they want out of a court-mandated law regulating doctor-assisted suicide likely to be introduced into Parliament this month, but they’re still trying to limit the damage.

If there is an issue that unites most politicians, health workers, social agencies and religious leaders, it is the urgent need for a bold strategy and major investment in palliative and hospice care.

To read the comments in various newspapers and on web sites, the Church has no place in national policy debates, including the current deliberation on assisted suicide. Of course that’s nonsense at any time of year but it seems particularly absurd at Easter.