An open letter signed by the Eastern Christian bishops of the United Kingdom has urged members of Parliament to reject the Assisted Suicide Bill, which returns to the House of Lords on Friday, September 12.
“As bishops of the Eastern Christian communities of the United Kingdom, representing over 2.5 million faithful, we call on all people of good will and, above all, on Parliament, to recognise the decisive moment this country now faces in the return to Parliament on Friday 12th September of the Assisted Suicide Bill, known as the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill,” the bishops wrote.
They warned that passing the legislation would signal a dangerous shift in society’s approach to human life: “This is the moment when the United Kingdom decides whether we hold every human life, every human being, to be valuable, or whether we decide that some lives are not worth living. Passing this Bill would move limited resources away from striving to offer the best possible care for vulnerable people facing long and painful illnesses, and towards offering ways to end their lives. If we take this step, we fundamentally change our relationship as a society toward human life. We must provide care, not killing.”
The bishops cited international examples, pointing to troubling precedents in Canada and the United States: “In Canada, only nine years since Medical Assistance In Dying (MAID) was introduced, the requirement for death to be ‘reasonably foreseeable’ has been dropped and, from 2027, assisted suicide will be allowed on grounds of mental illness alone. In Oregon, USA, almost half of those who ended their life by assisted suicide in 2024 reported concern about being a burden on family, friends, or caregivers.”
Highlighting the strain already felt in the National Health Service, they cautioned that legalizing physician-assisted suicide could further endanger the elderly and vulnerable: “Here, at a time when, in an overstretched NHS, elderly and vulnerable hospital patients can already find themselves facing unexpected ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ orders, even when facing non-terminal conditions, we can be certain that the introduction of legal physician-assisted suicide would result in enormous pressure on the vulnerable and the elderly in our society. The right to die quickly becomes the duty to die.”
The letter concluded with a direct appeal: “We call on the members of the House of Lords to reject this tragic and dangerous Bill.”
