PARIS (OSV News) — Ahead of the French Senate debate on the “assisted dying” bill Jan. 20, French bishops reaffirmed their opposition to the projected law, saying, “We do not care for life by giving death.”
The French bishops issued a Jan. 15 statement following numerous statements they have issued since the bill was initially introduced in June 2024, and an unprecedented public campaign urging Catholics to speak out in the spring of 2025. The latest statement was signed by members of the bishops’ permanent council, led by Cardinal Jean-Marc Aveline of Marseille, president of the bishops’ conference.
Passage by National Assembly last May
Until now, “active assistance in dying” was prohibited in France. But the bill adopting its principle as a “right” was passed on May 27, 2025, by the National Assembly, the lower house of the French Parliament.
President Emmanuel Macron, who previously called the bill a “law of fraternity,” said on Dec. 31 in his televised New Year’s address to the French people, that he desired to see the law adopted.
In France, end-of-life situations are currently governed by the Léonetti Law of 2005, which allows people, at the end of their lives, to refuse “futile medical care” and access palliative care. In 2016, the Claeys-Léonetti Law further authorized, under certain conditions, the possibility of resorting to deep and continuous sedation until death — if the patient is suffering unbearably, and death is recognized as inevitable and imminent.
France’s existing approach is ‘coherent’
For the bishops, this current “French approach” to the end of life is “coherent” and “valuable” — “to reject both unreasonable aggressive treatment and induced death, affirming both the right not to suffer and the duty to accompany life to its end,” they wrote.
The bishops reaffirmed that “palliative care is the only truly effective response to the difficult situations of the end of life,” noting that it “almost always leads to the disappearance of requests to die among terminally ill patients.”
However, the bishops pointed out that “even today, nearly a quarter of palliative care needs go unmet” in France, with 1 out of 5 administrative regions, or departments, lacking the necessary facilities. “If ‘people die badly in France,’ as is sometimes said, it’s not because administering a lethal substance to patients is not yet permitted,” the bishops wrote, “but because the existing law is insufficiently enforced and access to palliative care remains highly unequal across the country.”
A need to strengthen palliative care
Questioned on Jan. 15 on the Christian radio station RCF Radio Notre Dame, Emmanuel Hirsch, professor emeritus of medical ethics and member of the Academy of Medicine, confirmed that access to palliative care is not currently guaranteed for everyone in France, even though there is unanimous agreement on the need to strengthen it.
“In the Social Security financing bill, there is not a single line devoted to palliative care, even though it has been said that this is an absolute priority,” he warned.
In response, the bishops announced the Church’s resolution to “intensify its commitment” in this area, through the hospital structures under its authority.
But in recent months, many hospitals, clinics and nursing homes, including those run by religious communities, have expressed concern about the proposed “assisted dying” bill, already passed by the Assembly, calling for the possibility of what media called a “collective conscience clause.”
Catholic health care institutions
Catholic daily newspaper La Croix highlighted on Jan. 16 the “existential anxiety of Catholic health care institutions regarding assisted dying.”
“If tomorrow all the health care professionals in one of these institutions refused to perform assisted suicide or euthanasia, the director would be required to comply with the law by allowing outside health care personnel to intervene within the institution itself,” La Croix wrote.
In the event of refusal, the director could be liable for “obstruction,” incurring fines and prison sentences, which could threaten the very existence of these institutions, La Croix warned.
Debates on the “assisted dying” bill go far beyond political and religious divides, with both left- and right-wing driven campaigns started in France to oppose the bill. Senators will vote on the bill on Jan. 28.
‘Reject temptation to take a life’
In conclusion to their statement, the bishops stated unequivocally — also responding to the president calling the bill “law of fraternity” that real “fraternity invites us to definitively reject the temptation to take a life.”
“Fraternity, a core value of our Republic, does not consist of hastening the death of those who suffer or forcing caregivers to cause it,” but rather of “never abandoning those who are living through these incredibly difficult and painful moments.”
The bishops said, “Fraternity calls for a definitive rejection of the temptation to take a life, and, at the same time, for a resolute commitment to effectively developing palliative care throughout the country, strengthening the training of caregivers, supporting family members, combating isolation, and recognizing that vulnerability is part of the human condition.”
Caroline de Sury writes for OSV News from Paris.
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