As Maryland lawmakers again consider legalizing physician assisted suicide, the state’s Catholic bishops issued a statement Jan. 30 calling on Marylanders to reject this “deadly proposal” that puts “our most vulnerable brothers and sisters at risk of making decisions for themselves that are manipulated by factors such as disability, mental instability, poverty and isolation.”

“We urge all people of good will to demand that our lawmakers reject suicide as an end-of-life option and to choose the better, safer path that involves radical solidarity with those facing the end of their earthly journey,” the bishops wrote in their statement. “Let us choose the path that models true compassion and dignity to those facing end of life decisions and protects the most vulnerable from the deadly proposition of physician assisted suicide.”

Titled “A Better Way Forward,” the statement was signed by Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory, Baltimore Archbishop William Lori, and Wilmington Bishop William Koenig. Those three dioceses encompass the state of Maryland.

“In 2024, medical advancements and improvements in pain management mean we can make individuals with terminal illnesses comfortable and improve the quality of the remainder of their lives without them feeling the need to reluctantly choose a ‘dignified death’,” the bishops said. “It is incumbent upon each of us to ensure that those at the end of their lives can experience a death that doesn’t include offering a form of suicide prescribed by a doctor.”

The statement was issued as state lawmakers will deliberate allowing licensed physicians to legally prescribe medication at the request of a patient who has been deemed to have “the capacity to make medical decisions,” and “who has a terminal illness with a prognosis that likely will result in the individual’s death within six months.”

“It is deeply illogical for the State of Maryland to be seeking ways to facilitate suicide for those with a terminal illness, all the while claiming such preventable and unnecessary deaths are somehow dignified,” the bishops said.

Called the “End-of-Life Option Act (The Honorable Elijah E. Cummings and the Honorable Shane E. Pendergrass Act),” the bills are SB0443 with Sen. Jeff Waldstreicher (District 18 – lower Montgomery County) as the primary sponsor in the Senate, and HB0403 with Del. Terri Hill (District 12A – Howard County) as the primary sponsor in the House.

The Senate version of the bill is scheduled for a Feb. 8 public hearing before the Judicial Proceedings Committee. A joint committee hearing before the House Government Operations Committee and the House Judiciary Committee is slated for Feb. 16.

Last year, similar bills received public hearings, but did not advance out of their respective committees.

Jenny Kraska, the executive director of the Maryland Catholic Conference (MCC), noted that the measure is “the same bill that’s been introduced in past years.” Frequently called “medical aid in dying” or “death with dignity,” similar bills have been introduced in Maryland in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020 and 2023.

The MCC is the public policy arm of the state’s bishops, including The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. which includes five Maryland counties, the Archdiocese of Baltimore and the Diocese of Wilmington, Delaware, which includes the Eastern Shore.

It has joined with Maryland Against Physician Assisted Suicide (MAPAS), a nonpartisan coalition of health care professionals, disability rights advocates, mental health professionals, advocates for seniors, and members of faith communities that was organized in opposition to the push to legalize physician-assisted suicide in Maryland.

“In every state or country where this dangerous policy has been legalized grave abuses and expansion have occurred, making assisted suicide available to far more people and not just those facing imminent death,” the Maryland bishops said in their statement.

Only 10 states – California, Montana, Maine, Vermont, Colorado, New Jersey, Washington, New Mexico, Hawaii and Oregon – and the District of Columbia have legalized physician assisted suicide. 

With physician-assisted suicide, a doctor prescribes a lethal drug cocktail of up to 100 pills that a person picks up at the local pharmacy, grinds up and mixes into soft food.

“There’s been instances that I’ve heard anecdotal about people who have had reactions to the medication,” Kraska said. “And it burns the inside of their mouth, so they’re not able to consume all of the food. And that causes problems, people regurgitate some of it. There’s a lot of issues with this, as there should be.”

She noted that proponents of physician-assisted suicide “package this as a very nice – you say goodbye to everyone you know, you get your last hugs and well wishes and you just sort of fall asleep and don’t wake up.”

“That’s probably the furthest from the truth of what actually happens,” she stressed. “It takes anywhere from hours to days to pass away, and during that time it can be painful. It can be excruciating. People you know – your loved ones– are having to watch you have a hard time catching your breath or breathing… This isn’t just a peaceful take some pills and you slowly pass away and go to sleep.”

The Maryland bishops, in their statement quote Pope Francis who said, “We must accompany people towards death, but not provoke death or facilitate assisted suicide… life is a right, not death, which must be welcomed, not administered.”

The complete text of “A Better Way Forward,” the message on physician assisted suicide from the Catholic Bishops of Maryland, can be found at https://www.mdcatholic.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Md-bishops-pas2024.pdf

The MCC has an online toolkit for those who seek to work against legalizing physician assisted suicide. Visit www.mdcatholic.org/pas. It also has an active action alert to write legislators. Log on to https://p2a.co/WK2gk7Q .

The Catholic Advocacy Network helps Maryland Catholics learn about the issues and provides an opportunity for constituents to be heard by their legislators. Parishioners can join the Catholic Advocacy Network at mdcatholic.org/joincan.