Australian Capital Territory (ACT) legalized VAD<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201cHow quickly we went in this country from having no euthanasia legal at all to now more than 14,000 people have applied for it, more than 7,000 have died from it,\u201d Archbishop Fisher lamented.<\/p>\n
Voting to allow tele-consultations regarding VAD comes in the context of many other moves pushing for euthanasia to be even more common in the country. As a result, he pointed out how \u201cvery quickly, there are pushes then to remove\u00a0all the so-called safeguards one by one.\u201d<\/p>\n
A global debate <\/p>\n
Australia is not the only country making VAD legal and more accessible. France became the 14th country to allow assisted dying after years of debate on July 15, but under strict conditions. Thirteen states in the United States have legalized the practice. Assisted suicide has been legal in Switzerland since 1942.<\/p>\n
With the growing acceptance and legalization of VAD around the world, the Archbishop of Sydney argued that the Catholic Church in the countries with experience with VAD can help educate the newer nations.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This would help \u201cmake the case for being reverent and safeguarding human life\u201d, as the Sydney Archbishop explained. The new push for \u201ctelehealth, so-called, which is really tele-death,\u201d means simply having consultations over the phone or internet. Archbishop Fisher argued this removes very important steps in discerning the needs of a patient.<\/p>\n
\n Listen to Archbishop Fisher’s interview\n <\/p>\n
He argued telehealth means allowing people to access euthansia “without any serious consultation with a doctor, without any doctor having ever met them or talked through with them what care they really need, what their present needs for palliative care might be or for other kinds of medical treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pro-life alternatives <\/p>\n
In light of this ongoing debate, the Catholic Church maintains its stance on euthanasia or VAD as \u201cgravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his Creator\u201d (CCC 2324).<\/p>\n
Here, Archbishop Fisher stressed the local Church\u2019s duty in places facing the legalization of VAD. \u201cWe as a Church have to offer people positive alternatives,\u201d he noted. If people are given better palliative care, if they are shown love and attention, if the options are walked through with them, and if they learn of other ways to deal with suffering, they might not feel VAD is the only option.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if they are not offered other options, then a lot of people are frightened of losing control, frightened of being in a lot of pain, frightened of being a burden on others,\u201d the Archbishop explained.<\/p>\n
That is where the Church must step in. \u201cWe are by far the biggest providers of alternatives to euthanasia, of palliative care for people towards the end of life, of good pastoral care, respite care for the families who are caring for the dying and the elderly,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP\/\/\/yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7\" "\\"The")
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\n The Catholic community in Australia has been lobbying for having the right to opt out of euthanasia in Catholic healthcare and aged care institutions \u00a0 (AFP or licensors)\n <\/p>\n
Moreover, the Catholic community in Australia has been lobbying for having the right to opt out of euthanasia in Catholic healthcare and aged care institutions and for Catholic healthcare professionals.<\/p>\n
While some parts of the country have protection, others do not or have very little. The Catholic community, however, will continue to fight to offer patients, families, and individuals the option for life\u2014stressing their inherent human dignity and right to life from conception to natural death.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the ruling party in the country votes to make voluntary assisted dying accessible through online consultations, Archbishop…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62404,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[23,72632,32013,247],"class_list":["post-62403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sydney","tag-australia","tag-bishops","tag-euthanasia","tag-sydney"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.vaticannews.va\/content\/dam\/vaticannews\/agenzie\/images\/afp\/2025\/05\/28\/10\/1748420223992.jpg\/_jcr_content\/renditions\/cq5dam.thumbnail.cropped.750.422.jpeg\" "\\"The")
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