Catholic Academy Condemns Assisted Suicide After Archbishop Faces Backlash For Calling It ‘Feasible’

Catholic Academy Condemns Assisted Suicide After Archbishop Faces Backlash For Calling It ‘Feasible’

Kate Anderson on April 24, 2023

Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life (PAL), responded to claims that he supported assisted suicide after he called euthanasia “feasible” during an interview last week, according to a press release.

Paglia, who has been president of PAL, which determines the “principal problems of law and biomedicine,” since 2016, appeared to contradict PAL’s mandate in comments he made during an April 19 interview at the International Journalism Festival in Italy, where he said that he believed assisted suicide was “feasible,” according to The National Catholic Register. In response to backlash from the Catholic community, PAL released a statement Monday arguing that the Archbishop’s comments had been taken out of context.

“In his presentation, in which he dealt extensively with the subject of the end-of-life, Archbishop Paglia mentioned, without full development, Decision 242/2019 of the Italian Constitutional Court and its specific Italian context,” the press release read. “In this precise and specific context, Archbishop Paglia explained that in his view a ‘legislative initiative’ (certainly not a moral one) could be possible which would be consistent with the Decision and which preserves both the criminality of the act and the conditions in which the crime carries no penalty, as the Court requested Parliament to legislate.”

Official Translation. https://t.co/vINWda0tjb pic.twitter.com/gIEEjpZgMg

— Pontifical Academy Life (@PontAcadLife) April 24, 2023

While PAL said in the statement that Paglia was still opposed to assisted suicide, his comments during the interview raised concerns, according to The National Catholic Register.

“Personally, I would not practice suicide assistance, but I understand that legal mediation may be the greatest common good concretely possible under the conditions we find ourselves in,” Paglia said. “As believers, therefore, we ask the same questions that concern everyone, in the knowledge that we are in a pluralistic democratic society. In this case, about the end of (earthly) life, we find ourselves all facing a common question: How can we reach (together) the best way to articulate the good (ethical plane) and the just (legal plane), for each person and for society?”

The Catholic Church’s catechism regarding assisted suicide explains that ““intentional euthanasia, whatever its forms or motives, is murder” and “gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and the respect due to the living God, his Creator,” according to The Catholic News Register. The Vatican released a document on the subject from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2020, reiterating the Church’s position that euthanasia is considered a “grave sin,” according to the New York Times.

Pope Francis also addressed the issue in 2022, arguing that those who are suffering with a terminal or severe illness should be accompanied “towards death” but not “facilitate assisted suicide,” according to Catholic News Agency.

“I would point out that the right to care and treatment for all must always be prioritized, so that the weakest, particularly the elderly and the sick, are never discarded,” Francis said. “Indeed, life is a right, not death, which must be welcomed, not administered. And this ethical principle applies to everyone, not just Christians or believers.”

PAL did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.