Europe

Rome, Italy, Apr 24, 2018 / 11:12 am (CNA/EWTN News).- At the age of 16, Deborah Kloos was a distraught young woman who turned to the Church in hopes of finding solace, peace, and a reprieve from a “dysfunctional” and complicated family life.

She attended Mass often and sought comfort in the Eucharist. But she was sexually abused by a parish priest in Ontario.

After years of living with anger, sadness, and guilt, Kloos made her way back to the Church and was able to find healing through the sacraments. Now, she wants the Church to make praying for abuse survivors a priority.

She believes the Church has made progress on the abuse front, and has said that for real healing to happen, learning to forgive is key, as is keeping a positive attitude about the concrete efforts the Church is making.

“If we want to heal and make progress in healing we have to open up our hearts, pray together, communicate with one another, forgive one another, focus on the small changes in progress because they all count,” Kloos told CNA.

The Church “has made a lot of progress on the issue of clerical sexual abuse,” she said. “I know people are hurting deeply for this irreparable damage done as a result of clergy abuse and I know how painful it is as an abuse survivor.”

“When an infected wound like clergy abuse is covered up, it will fester and eventually will explode,” she said. “Only until the pus and ugliness is out of the wound, can it begin a healing process. It takes time, but we have to pray together and talk about it.”

Everyone deals with the trauma differently, she said, noting that in many cases people affected by abuse will likely never come back to the Catholic Church or bring their families to Mass.

“It is such a huge wound that only God can help with healing,” Kloos said, explaining that it is important for people to look at the progress that has been made and to “respect one another, because we are all human beings who are not perfect. We need God.”

Kloos, who lives in Canada with her husband, stopped attending Mass after she was sexually abused by a 63-year-old priest at her parish.

After the abuse happened, Kloos said she felt “sad and frustrated,” and was estranged from the Church for 20 years before eventually coming back when she enrolled her son in Catholic school.

“I carried a lot of guilt for years,” she said, but explained that she wanted her son to learn about God, so she put her son in Catholic school and started attending the school Masses. Eventually she began attending Mass everyday, and joined her parish choir.

The whole process “was emotionally hard for me, because I still carried so much anger and sadness, but I kept attending Mass,” she said, explaining that “the times I felt saddest and angry, I would feel this warm, supernatural light around me like a spiritual hug, like the Lord was hugging me and asking me to stay in the Church and not give up.”

However, Kloos said that after coming back to the Church, it was still hard for her to feel fully welcomed, because those wounded by abuse were not yet prayed for during Mass.

She began sending letters to her bishop in the Diocese of London, asking him to offer a Mass for victims of clerical abuse. For seven years she wrote with the same request, and she also made rosaries which she sent to clergy asking them to pray for those who have been wounded by abuse and who are far away from the Church.

She spoke of the importance of receiving the Eucharist, and lamented the fact that there are “thousands of people wounded by clergy and generations of people who may never enter a church again because of the irreparable damage caused by abuse that separated them from the Eucharist.”

There are many people who are addicted to drugs and alcohol, who struggle with mental health problems, families have broken up and there have been suicides, “all caused by abuse,” she said, stressing that this is why prayer is so necessary, yet often times the issue is still too taboo to talk about publicly in the Church.

“People just did not know how to deal with this,” she said.

“It is uncomfortable. I understand this. It hurts to acknowledge and talk about sin and abuse in the Church, but only when we pray together and bring the darkness into the Light, by asking God to help us, can communication, forgiveness, and healing occur.”

When the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors was established in March 2014, Kloos began writing to members voicing her desire for a day of prayer for abuse survivors. She also sent them artwork she had made as a way to heal and show how she found hope.

In 2016 the commission recommended that a day of prayer for abuse survivors be established, and Pope Francis accepted the proposal, asking that it be organized at a local level.

In the London diocese, the day of prayer was held on the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, and “it was beautiful.” Kloos voiced her gratitude to the clerics of her diocese for organizing the now-annual Mass, saying she believes they are doing their best, and are trying to move in the right direction.

“They are good people in my diocese and I care about them,” she said. “We have really dedicated clergy in the diocese. I feel it is important to focus on the positives and when people change for the better, then we should encourage them because a change of attitude and behavior takes time.”

Kloos has maintained close correspondence with members of the pontifical commission, including Fr. Hans Zollner SJ, head of the Center for Child Protection.

Commission members “need encouragement and positive support from people, especially clergy abuse survivors,” she explained. The members “work hard and need lots of prayer and support. I want to give them this support as a clergy abuse survivor and thank them.”

Kloos said she believes that while there is still more that needs to be done to prevent abuse and help survivors heal, the Church has made progress.

Citing guidelines and safety policies that have been put into place as well as suggestions for tougher screenings for Church employees and free counseling for clergy abuse survivors, Kloos said these are “huge changes” that she appreciates.

She also pointed to a course organized by the Center for Child Protection on the dangers of abuse in the digital world, and the degrees in child safety being offered by the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome.

Kloos voiced appreciation for Pope Francis’ recent apology for having made “serious mistakes” in the Chilean sexual abuse case.

Francis “had the courage to admit what he said was wrong to the Chilean abuse survivors and is meeting them now to apologize personally.”

She voiced her hope that the Church will continue to pray more intentionally for abuse survivors, especially during Mass.

Prayer “changes hearts to enable forgiveness and healing to occur, it opens up communication between people and asks God for help for the irreparable damage of clergy abuse that people feel uncomfortable talking about.”

“I understand that clergy abuse is something very painful for everyone, especially clergy, so they need lots of prayers and support too,” Kloos said.

In terms of learning how to talk about the issue more and make it less of a taboo subject, Kloos said she knows it will take time, because people “feel uncomfortable, threatened, afraid, and it is just human nature.”

“All that matters is that the right thing is done and that people work together for healing to make our Church better.”

[…]

London, England, Apr 23, 2018 / 10:38 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Monday a hospitalized British child at the center of a heated legal battle was granted Italian citizenship, part of an effort to delay shutting off his life-support, and to transfer him to a Roman hospital for additional treatment and medical evaluation.

Two-year-old Alfie Evans suffers from an unidentified degenerative neurological condition and has been under continuous hospitalization since December 2016.

On Monday the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) refused to intervene in what has been a highly sensitive and complicated case, paving the way for Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, where Evans has been receiving care, to shut off the infant’s life support.

After receiving the ruling from the ECHR Monday morning, the hospital scheduled Evans to be taken off life support later that day. However, according to Italian daily Avvenire, the official newspaper of the Italian bishops, Evans’ parents, Tom Evans and Kate James, were able to receive a last minute delay in order to clarify an aspect of the sentence.

Crowds of protesters lined the streets in front of the hospital Monday as they waited for the ruling, while Tom sent intermittent Facebook live posts from inside the hospital.

According to the BBC, some 200 protesters attempted to storm the hospital at one point, but were stopped by police, and backed off to the opposite side of the road.

In the meantime, Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano and Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti granted citizenship to Evans, in hopes that being an Italian citizen will allow the infant to be transferred to Italy immediately.

The decision comes less than one week after Alfie’s father, Tom, came to the Vatican to make a personal appeal to Pope Francis on his son’s behalf. In a private audience with the pope before his Wednesday general audience April 18, Tom Evans plead for asylum in Italy for his family, so that Alfie can be moved to the Bambino Gesu hospital in Rome to receive treatment.

Pope Francis has made several appeals for Alfie, asking in his April 15 Regina Coeli address for people to pray for Alfie and others “who live, at times for a long period, in a serious state of illness, medically assisted for their basic needs.”

The pope also recently tweeted about Alfie, saying it was his “sincere hope that everything necessary may be done in order to continue compassionately accompanying little Alfie Evans, and that the deep suffering of his parents may be heard.”

Debate surrounding the case flared up when in February the court ruled that Alder Hey Children’s Hospital could legally stop treatment for Alfie against his parent’s wishes. The hospital has argued that continuing treatment is not in his best interest.

Despite Tom and Kate’s desire to take their son to Bambino Gesu hospital in Rome, several judges ruled in the hospital’s favor. The case has since drawn international attention.

[…]

Belfast, Northern Ireland, Apr 22, 2018 / 04:27 am (CNA/EWTN News).- What would have been unthinkable 100 years ago in Northern Ireland will likely soon become a reality – Catholics will outnumber Protestants.  

Historically in Ireland, Catholics have desired independence for Ireland, while Protestants, who congregated in Northern Ireland, have wanted to maintain political ties to the United Kingdom.

This is still generally the case, though not without some significant exceptions on both sides. Still, the fact that Catholics may outnumber Protestants in the country by 2021 – 100 years after the country was founded – is remarkable.

Dr. Paul Nolan, who studies the social trends of Northern Ireland, told BBC News: “Three years from now we will end up, I think, in the ironic situation on the centenary of the state where we actually have a state that has a Catholic majority.”

According to the last census in 2011, Protestants outnumbered Catholics in Northern Ireland by just three percent. More recent numbers show a Catholic majority in every age group of the population, except for those over 60. Among school-aged children, Catholics outnumber Protestants by a wide margin – 51 percent to 37 percent.

Nolan said that unionism – the political ideology of those in Northern Ireland who wish to maintain their political ties with the U.K. – is still possible, though unionists should be aware of this demographic shift.

Religious disputes have long been part of the history of Northern Ireland, notably “the Troubles”, which included violent clashes between Catholics and Protestants that lasted from the late ‘60s until 1998, when the Good Friday Agreement was struck.

Last year, threats against Catholics in Northern Ireland have forced several families to flee their homes.

Mary Lou McDonald is president of the Sinn Féin party, which strongly supports nationalism, or an independent, united Ireland.

McDonald said she welcomed the discussion about what this shift in religious demographics could mean for Ireland.

“Of course unionists have to be at home in a new Ireland,” McDonald told the BBC. “So, yes, let’s have the discussion.”

[…]

Lviv, Ukraine, Apr 20, 2018 / 12:07 pm (CNA).- War continues to ravage eastern Ukraine, where conflict erupted in April 2014 following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the violent actions of pro-Russian separatists.

Along with forcing at least 1.6 million people from their homes, the ongoing conflict has also resulted in the persecution of Protestant pastors and churches throughout the territories that are occupied by pro-Russian separatist groups. One such group is the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR), which is located in Ukraine’s Luhansk region and declared independence in May 2014.

While the international community does not recognize the LNR as a legitimate state, this group’s totalitarian power is growing. During the last four years, the LNR has committed numerous acts of religious persecution against Protestant pastors and churches (as well as other pro-Ukrainian Churches) in the Luhansk region, including abduction, torture, and property confiscation. In fact, on March 27, 2018, the LNR raided the House of Prayer, a church in Stahanov, taking everything and leaving the church completely empty.

The following is a brief summary and analysis to create awareness about the LNR’s new religion law and appeal to the international community to create pressure on the LNR and support our brothers and sisters in Ukraine who are losing their freedom to worship and living in constant fear as they suffer for their faith.

For the last four years, Mission Eurasia has drawn the attention of the international community to the systematic religious freedom violations committed by the LNR in eastern Ukraine. And now these violations are considered a central part of the LNR’s legal framework.

According to a new law passed on Feb. 2, 2018 (#211-II “About Freedom of Conscience and Religious Organizations”), the LNR is permitted to discriminate against any and all non-Orthodox religious communities. This law violates universal human rights, severely limits religious freedom, and threatens eastern Ukraine’s existing network of religious communities and organizations.

While the law itself is a new development, the LNR has been violating religious freedom rights in Ukraine’s Luhansk region since the spring of 2014. Rather than protecting the rights of pre- existing religious communities, the LNR follows Russia’s religion laws. Therefore, in line with Russia’s strict religious freedom legislation, all religious communities and organizations in Luhansk, other than those associated with the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (the Russian Orthodox Church has preferential status), must now prove their loyalty and re-register with the LNR.

The following points laid out in the LNR’s new religion law are particularly concerning for churches in Luhansk:

• All religious communities and organizations must re-register with the LNR within six months of the law’s inception in order to continue operating;

• The LNR will play an increasingly significant role in regulating religious communities and organizations, and in protecting the societal role of the Russian Orthodox Church;

• All registered religious communities and organizations are required to provide detailed reports on all of their activities on a regular basis;

• Religious communities and organizations must have juridical person status to be considered legitimate;

• Religious communities and organizations must have at least 30 members to register;

• Religious communities and organizations are prohibited from leading activities in private residences, which is particularly dangerous for the many home churches in Luhansk;

• There are many grounds on which the LNR can suspend the activities of religious communities and organizations, such as suspected espionage, extremism, and terrorism;

• Religious communities and organizations are required to coordinate the distribution of all religious materials, even among their own members, with the LNR;

• There are very strict regulations placed on all religious communities and organizations that receive financial support from foreign sources.

The Baptist Union of Ukraine asserts that, even if churches in Luhansk try to re-register with the LNR, they will not be able to meet all of the requirements laid out in the new religion law.

In response, Mission Eurasia and our partner churches in Luhansk urge the global Christian community prayerfully to support our brothers and sisters who are suffering in the occupied territories of eastern Ukraine. We also implore international government leaders and human rights organizations to pressure the LNR to repeal the new law and restore religious freedom so that all religious communities in Luhansk and throughout Ukraine can worship freely.

At present, the pastors of many churches in the occupied territories of eastern Ukraine are refusing to participate in the re-registration process required by the LNR’s new religion law. These courageous leaders need our support as they stand firm in the face of escalating religious persecution.

Dr. Mykhailo Cherenkov is executive field director of Mission Eurasia and an associate professor of philosophy at the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv. This piece was first published at Dr. Cherenkov’s blog April 19, 2018. His opinions do not necessarily reflect the viewpoint of Catholic News Agency.

[…]

Munich, Germany, Apr 19, 2018 / 12:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The German bishops’ conference has denied reports that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has rejected its planned proposal to publish guidelines permitting non-Catholic spouses of Catholics to receive the Eucharist in some limited circumstances.

“Reports that the Vatican, whether the Holy Father or dicasteries, has rejected the handout are false,” conference spokesman Matthias Kopp said April 19.

In February, Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising announced that the German bishops’ conference would publish a pastoral handout for married couples that allows Protestant spouses of Catholics “in individual cases” and “under certain conditions” to receive Holy Communion, provided they “affirm the Catholic faith in the Eucharist”.

The announcement concerned a draft version of the guidelines, which were adopted “after intenstive debate” during a Feb. 19-22 general assembly of the German bishops’ conference under the leadership of Cardinal Marx, who is the conference chairman.

In his statement on Thursday, Kopp Cardinal Marx will inform his fellow bishops on the matter of the guidelines at an April 23 meeting.

The Archbishop of Munich and Freising has been invited to Rome by Pope Francis to discuss the problem. Several sources claim that Cardinal Rainier Woelki of Cologne, who has asked for clarification on the draft guidelines from the Vatican, has been invited as well.

It was reported yesterday by CNA and other media that the CDF had raised objections about the German bishops’ proposal; sources close to the congregation had confirmed this to CNA.

It is unclear whether the Vatican has asked the bishops’ conference to modify the contents of the draft guidelines, whether they have suspended the development of a draft while the matter is considered further, or whether it has been entirely rejected.

Last month, seven German bishops, led by Cardinal Woelki, sent a letter to the CDF and to the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity asking for clarification on the matter, appending a copy of the drafted guidelines. The signatories did not consult beforehand with Cardinal Marx.

The seven bishops reportedly asked whether the question of Holy Communion for Protestant spouses in interdenominational marriages can be decided on the level of a national bishops’ conference, or if rather, “a decision of the Universal Church” is required in the matter.

The letter was also signed by Archbishop Ludwig Schick of Bamberg, Bishop Gregor Hanke of Eichstätt, Bishop Konrad Zdarsa of Augsburg, Bishop Stefan Oster of Passau, Bishop Rudolf Voderholzer of Regensburg, and Bishop Wolfgang Ipolt of Görlitz.

“From the view of the signatories, the goal in a question of such centrality to the Faith and the unity of the Church must be to avoid separate national paths and arrive at a globally unified, workable solution by way of an ecumenical dialogue,” the Archdiocese of Cologne told CNA Deutsch April 4.

The Code of Canon Law already provides that in the danger of death or if “some other grave necessity urges it,” Catholic ministers licitly administer penance, Eucharist, and anointing of the sick to Protestants “who cannot approach a minister of their own community and who seek such on their own accord, provided that they manifest Catholic faith in respect to these sacraments and are properly disposed.”

[…]

Portsmouth, England, Apr 18, 2018 / 03:24 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After a London borough passed an ordinance earlier this month establishing a buffer zone around a local abortion clinic, Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth said he was concerned by the unjust… […]

Rome, Italy, Apr 18, 2018 / 11:53 am (CNA/EWTN News).- One of the leading organizers of this year’s World Meeting of Families has said the gathering aims to show the world that living the Christian ideal of marriage and family life is not impossible, but is something realistic that can be attained.

“Our message about marriage and family, about fidelity, that God loves you personally, that human life is sacred from the first moment of conception until the moment of death, that chastity is possible for our young people,” is a message often seen as out-of-date, Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh said.

Yet these messages “are achievable for people today,” he said.

“Sometimes people present the Church as being completely out of touch, but actually the Church is hugely in touch. It just wants to keep challenging people to the joy of the Gospel.”

Archbishop Martin spoke to CNA April 18 about the upcoming World Meeting of Families, which is slated to take place in Dublin Aug. 21-26.

Pope Francis will be present at the event Aug. 25-26, where he will preside over the “festival of families” and the closing Mass.

The World Meeting of Families is meant to share “the idea that family is good news, that it is a joyful message, that family is possible,” he said.

We too often “forget the huge number of families who continue faithfully to try to live out a life of love and a life of understanding and commitment to one another in very difficult or challenging circumstances,” he said.

Families, he said, are the first place where people learn to go outside of themselves through compromise and sacrifice, which goes against the individualistic mentality of global society.

“Very few families can survive individualism,” he said, explaining that one’s approach to family life has to start from the perspective of love and joy, which are the heart of the Gospel.

This in turn raises questions about how much social, political and legislative support is available to families, and how challenges can arise if this support is not given.

“Why is it that so many young people will choose not to get married? Maybe because they can’t get a hold of a mortgage, or because the benefit system suits them better to live as single people rather than as a couple with their children. Why is it that legislation on issues like addictions, gambling, or a whole lot of areas where family life can be destroyed, why are these not priorities in social policy-making?”

So in addition to focusing on the Gospel vision of the family, the “harder edge” of the global gathering in August will focus on how families can be supported from all levels of the Church and of society.

Some 16,000 people have registered for the event, most of whom are from overseas, Martin said.

And as the date gets closer, organizers on the ground are starting to “ratchet up” the preparations at a faster pace.

“This is an opportunity for families to meet families from other parts of the world and to learn from each other and to share with one another how we do it; how do we actually survive as a family in this crazy, complicated world,” Martin said.

Excitement is building and Ireland is ready to give the pope and the world “a hundred thousands of welcomes,” he said, using a colloquial Irish saying.

Martin said the gathering will be a time for families to come together and share their experiences, their hopes, and their challenges, without sugar-coating anything.

Acknowledging that no family is perfect, “we’re not in any way trying to romanticize family love,” he said. Rather, the goal is to share the Christian vision of the family, based on hope and love, and to welcome families who are distant or who perhaps don’t feel welcome, he said.

“The word ‘welcome’ is important,” he said, adding that for him, it is sad to hear when people say that for whatever reason, they do not feel entirely welcome in the Church.

And this goes not only for “these neuralgic issues, for example LGBT people or people living in second unions … I’m talking about people who think the Church’s vision of the family is completely out of touch with reality,” Martin said.

“I would love to think that we can talk about ways of welcoming families, welcoming people who … feel that they don’t measure up, or feel that unless their family is perfect, that everyone in their family is living a perfectly holy life, that they are not welcome,” he said.

To this end, he pointed to Gaudete et exsultate, Pope Francis’ exhortation on the call to holiness in today’s world, saying example of holiness can be found in “your mom, your grandmother, your dad. People who struggled but lived as best they could a faithful life.”

“So I think that when we think about reaching out, sometimes we think they are people way out on the margins, but often they are people who are simply trying to struggle to live a good family life everyday and who feel that somehow the Church presents an impossible ideal.”

[…]

Portsmouth, England, Apr 16, 2018 / 04:56 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth has encouraged Catholics, as the “people of life”, to be positive and confident in sharing the good news of life.

“There is now in society great confusion and conflict about what it means to be human, about relationships, sexuality and love, but also, most seriously, about the actual value and dignity of human life itself from conception to natural death,” Bishop Egan wrote in an April 15 pastoral letter.

He noted that it has been more than 50 years since abortion was legalized in Great Britain, and that “As a people of life, our efforts to defend the unborn child, to care for pregnant mothers and to reverse or blunt this Act have had mixed results and it now looks as if, unjustly, our secularist government will no longer allow us even to pray outside hospitals and clinics.”

The British parliament and some localities are considering establishing “buffer zones” around abortion clinics to keep away pro-life protestors and those offering alternatives to abortion. One London borough has already established one of these “Public Space Protection Orders”.

“We need to change tack,” the bishop stated.

He is discussing “new forms of witness” with pro-life groups, and has decided that Oct. 23, the day the Abortion Act 1967 was passed, will be kept as a “Day of Prayer and Reparation for Life” in the Diocese of Portsmouth. Priests there are to say a Mass for the Progress of Peoples wearing purple vestments to show penitence.

Bishop Egan added that this year is the 50th anniversary of  the “prophetic” encyclical Humanae vitae, in which Bl. Paul VI warned, “there would be catastrophic consequences for persons, families and society” if the procreative and unitive ends of sexual intercourse were severed.

“Years on,” the bishop wrote, “we can now see exactly what he meant in broken family relationships, the reduction of sex to a casual activity, the trafficking of people for prostitution and pornography, the sexualisation of the young.”

“I intive everyone to revisit this teaching and to reflect on the alternative ‘spiritual ecology’ that the Gospel proposes for family life, when natural methods of fertility and family planning are used. Our diocesan Marriage and Family Life Team are keen to help and to give advice.”

The Bishop of Portsmouth linked being a “people of life” to the need to respond to “evil, injustice, suffering and violence in our world, including the abuse of the Earth and its resources.”

He noted Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato si’, “in which he begs people to live an authentically human ecology, a more balanced, simple life-style.”

“It would be good to re-read Laudato Si alongside Humanae Vitae,” Bishop Egan recommended. “As Catholics, we should live an integrally ‘green’ and natural way of life. To do this, of course, given our fallen nature, we need the love of Christ and the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit.”

While “Ours is an era of amazing advances in knowledge and technology, from science and medicine to the arts and humanities … the demise of faith and religion, the demise even of people praying, is rapidly undermining in Britain the foundations of ethics,” he then warned.

“This dilution of our Christian patrimony threatens to usher in a frightening new Dark Age. No wonder a death-wish is arising for assisted suicide and euthanasia,” he said, referring in particular to the proposed legalization of assisted suicide in Guernsey, a Crown dependency which is part of the Portsmouth diocese.

Catholics, a people of life, must not ignore these challenges, but act, asking Christ “to help us reach out in love to those around, to assist people develop a personal relationship with God. This is fundamental to the mission of our schools and parishes.

“But more than this, we must enable the Catholic Tradition to engage positively and constructively with culture and society.”

To this end, he said, the diocese will hold a symposium on “Science – or – Religion?”

“It will tackle positively some of the issues that current advances raise: What does it mean to be human? How can we be happy? What does the Gospel say about life?” Egan said.

Ultimately, Egan urged Catholics to rediscover their love for life through their relationship with God, and asked for their prayers and action in order to promote a culture of life.

“So I ask you now: Be people of life! Love Jesus; keep close to Him and adore Him in the Eucharist. Read the Gospels; study the Church’s social teaching and be open to the questions people raise. This will help us to become positive, confident, ‘can-do’ Catholics.”

“May Mary Immaculate, St. Edmund of Abingdon, and Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati inspire us and pray for us.”

[…]

Saint Peter Port, Guernsey, Apr 16, 2018 / 02:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Christian leaders on the Channel Island of Guernsey have united to author an open letter opposing assisted suicide legislation which will be debated in the coming months.

Signed by 53 pastoral ministers and 41 churches, the letter spelled out the dangers of introducing physician assisted suicide in the bailiwick, calling the measure dangerous for the community.

“We believe the proposal to introduce a legal provision for assisted dying to be misplaced and indeed a danger for us as a community, particularly for the most vulnerable in our island,” read the letter.

“We believe the States of Guernsey should focus on the care of vulnerable people, support the Les Bourgs Hospice, increase mental health provision and care well for those with age-related dementia. As a community we need to celebrate and support all of life and not actively seek to terminate life.”

“Every life is a gift that is precious and worthy of defense. Living life in all its fullness will include darker times, pain and sorrow. This is part of the rich diversity and tapestry of life that also provides opportunities for care, generosity, kindness and selfless love,” the letter continued.

One of the letter’s signatories, John Guille, is chairman at Les Bourgs Hospice. Other signatories of the letter included officials of the Catholic Church, the Church of England, and Methodism.

Debate on the whether to approve in assisted suicide legislation in principle will take place May 16 in the territory’s legislature, the States of Guernsey. Guernsey is a Crown dependency for which the U.K. is responsible, located off the coast of Normandy.

Current laws in Guernsey do not make allowances for physician assisted suicide and the island’s prominent hospice center, Les Bourgs, adheres to the World Health Organization’s ethos of hospice and palliative care, which upholds that end-of-life care may “neither hasten or postpone death,” according to the Guernsey Press.

“We are taking the exceptional step of writing to the people of Guernsey as Church leaders across a wide community of Christian witness,” the Christian ministers wrote.

In the letter, the church leaders cautioned against the popular push for “choice” when it comes to end-of-life care, saying that it should not be “the primary argument for life and death issues.”

“Deeper ethical and moral considerations should have much greater weight in matters of island policy and law,” they said, also noting that “individual ‘choice’ is not an isolated event,” but rather something that effects other people and society as a whole.

“Our decisions can also be influenced by profound life-changing events,” they continued, noting that an illness or a grim diagnosis would have a profound effect on a person’s ultimate end of life care.

The leaders also highlighted mental health conditions, such as depression, which could push an individual to pursue assisted suicide, instead of looking into other options. They encouraged the “support of those who love us,” during these challenging times, instead of pushing death.

The States’ consideration of the assisted dying measure would also hold a great weight for the vulnerable on the island, the church ministers noted, saying that individuals with disabilities, the elderly, and others with sicknesses will see the measure as “a threat.”

They also noted that the legislation would dramatically affect the relationship between doctors and patients, “threatening the trust that issuing life-ending prescriptions will bring.” The assisted suicide legislation could additionally open the doors to other measures, the leaders wrote, reaching beyond the conditions of those nearing their lives.

“Of the few other jurisdictions that have introduced assisted dying most have, over time, seen the initial safeguards eroded and criteria broadened to include other conditions beyond terminally ill people,” the letter said.

“To assist in the death of another is essentially to assist in their suicide,” the letter continued.

Ultimately, the Christian leaders on Guernsey urged citizens to discern deeply the potential impact of introducing physician assisted suicide, particularly on the community’s most vulnerable citizens.

“Our hope and prayer is that the requete is rejected by the States,” the letter said. “This is a life and death issue so please contact your deputies with your views, doing so with the care and compassion that sustains our island community.”

Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth, the diocese which encompasses Guernsey, had spoken out against the assisted suicide proposal in a letter last month to the Parish of Our Lady and the Saints of Guernsey. He urged Catholics to “mobilize” and to “speak out against this proposal.”

“Someone near the end of life needs emotional support, comfort and care, good pain control, respect and loving communication – not suicide on prescription,” Egan said.

If the upcoming legislation passes, Guernsey would be the first territory among the British Isles to legalize assisted suicide.

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Rome, Italy, Apr 16, 2018 / 10:25 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Benedict XVI turned 91 on Monday, celebrating “with his brother Georg in a calm and familiar climate,” according to a Vatican statement.

This evening, members of the Swiss Guard band a… […]