Louise Sallé 13:31 pm, March 28, 2023

While the Citizens' Convention on the End of Life is preparing to present its recommendations at the end of the week, the France Bishops' Conference reveals to Europe 1 that it opposes an evolution of the law on the end of life.

Invited to the France Bishops' Conference, which starts this Tuesday in Lourdes, a hundred bishops co-sign a political text to oppose a new law on the end of life. The conclusions of the Citizens' Convention, which has been studying this subject for four months, will be unveiled next Sunday. Europe 1 had access to the content of the text signed by the bishops.

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"We are for life"

This text is a very frank position in favor of "the sick and disabled in this symbolic place of healing that is Lourdes". The Church says it is sensitive to their suffering. It calls for the development of palliative care without yielding "to the legal and economic ease of active assistance in dying".

Monsignor Vincent Jordy is Archbishop of Tours. He is vice-president of the France Bishops' Conference. He explains at the microphone of Europe 1 the position of the bishops of France: "We are in a week a little decisive since the President of the Republic will receive the result of the Citizens' Convention. Around this debate on the end of life and assisted suicide, there is the whole question of the fragile person, the person in poverty humanly or relationally. We are for life."

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"We believe that the accompaniment of the elderly is an extremely important reality and we need to think of it in this way," he continues.

The bishops thus support the caregivers who say that the hand that cares cannot be the one that gives death. They also call for respect for the value of life to reflect on an active help to live.