Church Bid for Unity Against Law
By RACHEL BUCHANAN, STEVE DOW The Age, 29 May 1995
An Anglican Church leader warned yesterday that Australian churches may take joint action to campaign against states following the Northern Territory’s lead by passing voluntary euthanasia legislation.
Archbishop Peter Hollingworth, the chairman of the National Anglican Social Responsibilities Commission, called voluntary euthanasia laws "an attempt to substitute killing for care".
"The Northern Territory legislation has failed in its moral obligation to preserve the dignity of human life," Archbishop Hollingworth said after a commission meeting in Canberra yesterday.
"...It is a shameful first."
The legislation also came under renewed attack from the Australian Medical Association, which passed an urgent motion condemning it at its annual conference in Hobart at the weekend.
Dr Brendan Nelson, who stepped down as AMA president at the weekend, said the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act sent the wrong message to young Australians about the value of human life.
"At a time when almost as many young Australians die of suicide as they do in car accidents, we have got governments who apparently want to help people commit suicide."
The AMA’s newly-elected president, Dr David Weedon, said practical problems would start to emerge. "Are there doctors that are going to form the death squads?" he said.
Father Mark Coleridge, a spokesman for the Catholic Church in Melbourne, said he would support any formal moves for joint action by churches. He said he had been struck by the unity of the Christian churches and by the Jewish and Islamic condemnation of the Northern Territory law.
The Rights of the Terminally Ill Bill was passed last Thursday morning, making the Territory the first place in the world to legalise voluntary euthanasia.
On Friday, the Victorian Premier, Mr Kennett, said State Parliament might consider voluntary euthanasia legislation next year. The South Australian Parliament is already considering such legislation and an ACT independent, Mr Michael Moore, plans to introduce a similar private member’s bill.
Archbishop Hollingworth said the bill removed the cornerstone of the legal system the protection of life.
The Anglican and Catholic churches argue that better palliative care is the way to provide death with dignity.
The Reverend Norman Ford, the director of the Caroline Chisholm Centre for Health Ethics (a Catholic-run centre), said the Northern Territory law would lower the standing of all doctors and health-care professionals in the Territory. He called for specialist euthanasia clinics to be set up.
The Reverend Dr Warren Bartlett, the moderator of the Uniting Church in Victoria, said the church would have to give careful consideration to involvement in a united campaign against euthanasia.
The Uniting Church did not have an official position on the issue but Dr Bartlett applauded the courage of the former Chief Minister, Mr Marshall Perron, in introducing the bill.
Meanwhile, palliative-care groups will use the historic Northern Territory decision to legalise euthanasia to draw distinctions between mercy killing and their form of care.
The Australian Association of Hospice and Palliative Care has refused to support or oppose the legislation. But the executive officer of the association’s Victorian branch, Mr Chris Hobson, said the debate would allow new attention to be paid to palliative care and to dispel misconceptions and confusion between the two.
He said palliative-care practitioners would take part in the euthanasia debate by putting forward their arguments for the palliative care option.