SerpApi.Org
Seven members of the Little Sisters of the Poor left their order's motherhouse in La Tour Saint-Joseph, France, on Aug. 28, 1868, and headed for the coast. Three days later, they boarded the Napoleon III steamship and began a trip across the Atlantic.
Two weeks later, they arrived in New York.
Then, a few days after that, they established their first American nursing home in Brooklyn.
"On September 20 they welcomed their first old pensioner, a woman eighty-two years of age," says a history of the order published in 1902.
One of the sisters then wrote back to the motherhouse about how well received they were in this American city.
"The public appear delighted to see that the Little Sisters of the Poor are willing to work for the poor; that they ask no endowment; that they desire to trust in Providence and in the generosity of the public," she said. "Neither the population of New York nor of Brooklyn seem to be roused on seeing the habit of the Little Sisters; I have not even seen the shadow of a hostile demonstration."
Now, 158 years later, the government of the state of New York is taking a much different approach to the Little Sisters of the Poor and three other orders of Catholic nuns who care for the elderly and the ill. It is seeking to limit their religious liberty.
In February, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the euphemistically titled "Medical Aid in Dying Act," which legalized assisted suicide in the state and mandated various levels of cooperation from health care providers.
"Our state will always stand firm in safeguarding New Yorkers' freedoms and right to bodily autonomy, which includes the right for the terminally ill to peacefully and comfortably end their lives with dignity and compassion," Hochul said in a statement when she signed the law.
"New Yorkers deserve the choice to endure less suffering, not by shortening their lives, but by shortening their deaths — I firmly believe we made the right decision," she said.
Hochul claimed this law had a viable religious exemption. Among the "guardrails" it included, her statement said, was, "(a)llowing religiously-oriented home hospice providers to opt out of offering medical aid in dying" and providing that "no health care professional or religiously affiliated health facility would be forced to offer medical aid in dying"
Bishop John Barres of the Diocese of Rockville Centre, New York, adamantly opposed this law. "Governor Hochul's decision to sign into law the assisted suicide bill is a tragedy and a grave moral failure," he wrote. "In explaining her decision, the governor invoked personal liberty — the right of the individual to make determinations about the direction of his/her life. Sadly, this law facilitates abuse and manipulation of the elderly, the disabled, and those who suffer from mental or emotional illnesses."
"Our Catholic institutions cannot and will not participate in physician-assisted suicide," he wrote. "We will continue to proclaim the love of God for every individual person, created in His image, that endures every circumstance, and we will never abandon the sick and suffering to death. We will care for them until the end of their natural lives."
Last week, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed a lawsuit against New York on behalf of Bishop Barre and four orders of Catholic nuns, namely the Little Sisters of the Poor, the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm, the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, and the Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict. This lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York, argues that despite the New York law's narrow religious exemption, it would still require these religious institutions to cooperate in the process of assisted suicide in a way that violates their religious freedom and freedom of speech.
"New York ... forces religious providers to participate fully in the informing, counseling, and qualifying stages of assisted suicide," says Becket's complaint.
"(I)ndividual physicians are exempt only from the very last step in the process of assisting in a patient's suicide," it says. "The MAID Act states only that they are not 'under any duty, by law or contract, to participate in the provision of medication to a patient under this article.'"
"This narrow exemption means physicians are required to participate in the rest of the elaborate process of informing patients about their ability to commit suicide using lethal drugs or qualifying a patient to obtain those drugs," says the complaint.
When a doctor declines for religious reasons to actually administer life-ending drugs to a patient, the doctor is still required by this New York law to participate in transferring the patient to a different health care facility.
"If a physician is 'unable or unwilling to participate in the provision of medication to a patient,' then the physician 'shall transfer or arrange for the transfer, upon request, of a copy of the patient's relevant medical records to the new health care provider,'" says the Becket complaint.
The law imposes the same requirements on religious health care institutions. "New York likewise forces religious healthcare facilities to participate fully in the informing, counseling and qualifying stages of assisted suicide," says the complaint.
"If a patient in an objecting facility requests lethal drugs to commit suicide, the objecting facility 'shall' transfer the patient 'promptly to another health care facility that is reasonably accessible under the circumstances and willing to permit the prescribing, dispensing, ordering and self-administering' of lethal suicide drugs," says the complaint.
The Becket complaint cited the Catholic teaching on euthanasia and assisted suicide as explained in "Dignitas Infinita," a declaration issued by the Vatican's Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.
"(H)elping the suicidal person to take his or her own life," said this declaration by the Catholic Church, "is an objective offense against the dignity of the person asking for it, even if one would be thereby fulfilling the person's wish: 'We must accompany people towards death, but not provoke death or facilitate any form of suicide."
Requiring Catholic nuns or health care institutions to in any way facilitate assisted suicide violates their First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion. New York's law should be struck down.
To find out more about Terence P. Jeffrey and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.
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