Women religious sue New York over law they say would force them to assist in patient suicides
Four orders of women religious and Catholic healthcare ministries filed a lawsuit in Albany on July 17, 2026, challenging New York’s assisted‑dying law. The suit claims the law would force them to facilitate physician‑assisted suicide, violating their Catholic faith and the Church’s teaching that such acts are morally unacceptable. The orders—Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm, Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict, and Little Sisters of the Poor—argue that the law conflicts with their mission to provide compassionate, non‑abandoning care to the elderly and dying. New York’s Attorney General has not yet responded, while the state’s governor signed the law in February, citing protection of patient autonomy.
2 months ago
Four Catholic women‑religious orders and the Diocese of Rockville Centre have filed a federal lawsuit in Albany challenging New York’s new physician‑assisted‑suicide law, arguing that it compels them to violate their faith and constitutional rights. 1
In February 2026 Governor Kathy Hochul signed legislation that permits physicians to prescribe lethal medication to terminally‑ill adults who request it. The law is scheduled to take effect in August and makes New York the 13th state, plus the District of Columbia, to legalize assisted dying. 1 2
The plaintiffs are the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm, the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, the Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict, the Little Sisters of the Poor, and the Diocese of Rockville Centre. They are represented by the Becket Fund, a religious‑liberty law firm. The complaint was filed on July 17, 2026 in federal court in Albany. 1 2 3
Mother Mary Rose Heery, prioress general of the Carmelite Sisters, said the law strikes at the heart of their vocation to bring “Christ’s unbounded love” to the elderly. 1
Bishop John O. Barres of Rockville Centre declared, “We will never submit to New York’s culture of death,” and described assisted suicide as a “grave moral failure” that endangers vulnerable people. 1 2
Governor Hochul defended the statute, asserting that legislative safeguards protect patient autonomy and ensure the integrity of the decision‑making process. The Attorney General’s office has not responded to comment requests. 1
The Catholic Church’s Catechism labels euthanasia and physician‑assisted suicide as “morally unacceptable,” citing the Fifth Commandment, “You shall not kill.” 1
The plaintiffs are seeking a preliminary injunction to halt enforcement of the law while the case proceeds. 1 2*
Catholic conscience rights versus state assisted‑suicide law
Catholic “rights of conscience” do not mean a person can treat an intrinsically immoral act as morally permitted merely because a state allows it. Instead, Catholic teaching presents conscience as a judgment that must be formed in the truth and remains subordinated to objective moral law—which, for the Church, includes the inviolable prohibition of euthanasia and assisted suicide.
Catholics do have a genuine moral and religious claim rooted in the human duty to seek truth. Catholic conscience is not treated as a private “tribunal” that can override reality; rather, it is an act of practical reason that must measure human choices against the truth of the good.
A key point is that the Church teaches that every person has the duty and right to seek the truth in religious matters and to form “right and true judgments of conscience” through appropriate means.
But this does not imply conscience is infallible. Catholic moral theology holds that conscience can be true or false; if it is erroneous, there is a moral obligation to correct it through formation.
So, when a state creates a legal permission to do something morally forbidden, the Catholic question is not “Which option is legally available?” but “What does the truth of the moral law require?”—with conscience obliged to conform to that truth.
The Church teaches that euthanasia and assisted suicide are not merely regrettable outcomes of a tragic situation; they are classified by their moral object—they intentionally cause death to eliminate pain.
From that standpoint, Catholic doctrine states that euthanasia is “an intrinsically evil act, in every situation or circumstance.”
The Church further adds that approval and legal authorization are not morally neutral. It teaches that those who approve laws of euthanasia and assisted suicide become accomplices of grave sin executed by others, and they are also guilty of scandal—because such laws distort conscience even among the faithful.
It also rejects the claim that these acts are “care” for the patient: the Church says they are “never a real service to the patient, but a help to die.”
Because the Church regards euthanasia and assisted suicide as intrinsically wrong, Catholic moral reasoning cannot treat legality as the standard. In Catholic terms, a conscience that concludes “I may assist killing because the law permits it” is at serious risk of failing to be ordered to truth.
This is why the Church can speak sharply about legalizing these practices: it says it is “gravely unjust” to enact laws legalizing euthanasia or supporting suicide, and that such laws strike at the foundation of the legal order by undermining the right to life that sustains other rights.
Nothing in the Church’s teaching denies that persons may face real moral conflict. The point is that Catholic conscientious freedom is meant to protect obedience to God’s law and to truth, not to license participation in what the Church calls homicide.
The Church states explicitly that health care workers, faithful to their task of serving life “up until the very end,” cannot give themselves to euthanistic practice “neither at the request of the interested party, and much less that of the family,” and they cannot be compelled to execute a “non-existent right.”
For Catholic institutions, the Ethical and Religious Directives are even more direct: Catholic health care institutions may never condone or participate in euthanasia or assisted suicide in any way.
So “conscience rights” in this area are best understood as the right and duty to refuse cooperation with the wrongful act, while still caring compassionately for the dying.
The Church does not propose abandonment of the sick and dying. Instead, it distinguishes euthanasia/assisted suicide from legitimate medical limits and palliative care.
Pope John Paul II highlights the moral difference between discontinuing burdensome, dangerous, or disproportionate medical procedures (the Catechism’s “refusal of ‘over-zealous’ treatment”) and taking away ordinary means of preserving life.
He stresses that a presumption should exist in favor of providing medically assisted nutrition and hydration to patients who need them, and that omitting them with the intention to cause death “must be rejected.”
This matters because in real-world settings, legal frameworks can blur categories—turning “treatment that no longer helps” into a systematic practice of causing death.
Pope Francis describes authentic palliative care as a genuine form of compassion: it responds to suffering by affirming the dying person’s inviolable dignity and helping them accept the inevitable transition to eternal life—while warning that euthanasia is never a source of hope or genuine concern for the sick and dying.
Thus, Catholics can support laws and policies that improve pain control, hospice resources, spiritual support, and accompaniment—because those are forms of care that do not involve intentional killing.
Catholic social teaching expects more than private refusal; it also calls Catholics to political responsibility rooted in the protection of human life.
The U.S. bishops’ Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship says that Catholics cannot dismiss Church guidance on policies that affect fundamental human life.
It teaches that the deliberate taking of human life by assisted suicide and euthanasia is an unjustifiable assault on human life, and that laws legalizing these practices are profoundly unjust and immoral.
It also calls for greater assistance for the sick and dying through health care and effective, compassionate palliative and hospice care, describing end of life as a holy moment requiring reverence and accompaniment.
Correspondingly, Pope John Paul II urged a public teaching effort to clarify the real moral distinction between legitimate medical limitations and taking away life-preserving means—especially in the context of campaigns to legalize physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia.
Catholic teaching produces a three-part logic:
In short: Catholic conscience rights support refusing wrongful participation and demanding genuine palliative care; they do not provide a moral license to assist suicide simply because the state has legalized it.