The English and Welsh bishops are inviting Catholics to join a holy hour to pray for the defeat of an assisted suicide bill.
They are urging the faithful to pray either before the Blessed Sacrament in parish churches or in their own homes for an hour from 5.30 p.m. London time Nov. 13, in the hope that the Terminally-Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill will fail.
The bill, introduced into the House of Commons by Labour Member of Parliament Kim Leadbeater, will decriminalize assisted suicide for adult patients deemed to have just six months to live. Two doctors and a High Court judge must approve all applications.
In a video message posted on the website of the bishops’ conference of England and Wales, Cardinal Vincent Nichols of Westminster urged Catholics to pray ardently ahead of a vote at a second reading debate in the House of Commons on Nov. 29.
“We offer our prayers this holy hour for the dignity of human life,” said Cardinal Nichols, the president of the bishops’ conference.
“In particular our focus is on the end of life and praying together in front of the Blessed Sacrament that assisted suicide will not become law in our lands,” he said.
“We pray passionately that we will not take a step in legislation that promotes a so-called ‘right to die,'” he continued.
“That will quite likely become a duty to die and place pressure on doctors and medical staff to help take life rather than to care, protect, and heal,” added Cardinal Nichols. “This is an important moment in our history.”
The bishops have made two sheets of suggested readings, intercessions and reflections available for use in the holy hour.
Since Leadbeater introduced her bill in mid-October, the bishops have asked Catholics to write to members of Parliament to encourage them to oppose it.
Cardinal Nichols, Archbishop Mark O’Toole of Cardiff and Menevia and Bishops Mark Davies of Shrewsbury, Patrick McKinney of Nottingham, Paul Swarbrick of Lancaster and Bishop Peter Collins of East Anglia all wrote pastoral letters asking Catholics of their dioceses to take action.
Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth also wrote a pastoral letter in which he said that the ideology behind assisted suicide was comparable to Nazism.
The failure of Catholics to act, he said, would be to “capitulate to the very ideology” Britain fought against in World War II.
“If we yield to this and permit killing, we will cross a line from which there is no return,” he said.
The vote on assisted suicide will be the first since 2015, when a bill was rejected by 330 to 118.
The bishops’ suggested readings and prayers for “A Holy Hour on the Dignity of Human Life” are available online: https://www.cbcew.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2024/11/HH-Dignity-of-Life.pdf
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