I am very pleased to welcome you to Liverpool and hope that your stay will be a time of blessings. Storm Amy has disrupted traffic and the rail network and brought both energy to the sea and danger to the city and region. I hope that, as the winds subside, you will enjoy some of the sights of the city.

I thank you for the opportunity to address you for this lecture in honour of Brother Jack McArdle. I thank you for your pro-life work and the constancy with which you have alerted your members to the dangers of legislation against life in England and Wales, Scotland, Ireland and the other islands of Jersey and the Isle of Man. I thank you for your prayers and actions in contacting MPs and Peers and highlighting concerns of the developing legislation.

I will structure this talk in four sections. First, I will outline my present concerns about the Kim Leadbeater bill now named the Terminally Ill Adults Bill, then the recent changes in legislation about the beginning of life. Thirdly, I will identify some of the underlying philosophical trends and challenges of this age and finally suggest a way to represent our teaching so as to attract others into the dialogue. Then a time for questions.

The Threat of the Terminally Ill Adults(End of Life) Bill

I will refer to this Bill as introducing ‘assisted suicide’ because that is what it is. A doctor would give to a person a lethal dose of drugs which they must self-administer and would end their life. There is an intention to end life. There is a debate about which drugs would be prescribed, their rate of action and the length of time it would take a person to die. The language of ‘assisted dying’ is euphemistic and misleading. It is important to describe what we are actually doing – palliative care drugs ease pain and can be described as assisting dying, but they do not have the intention to kill the patient. You may recall that Baroness Theresa May received much criticism for using the term ‘assisted suicide’ in debate in the Lords. Lord Moore has written well in columns on this subject.

The Bill passed its Third Reading in the House of Commons on June 20th with a vote of 314 in favour to 291 against. The majority was smaller than in the First Reading. There is no doubt that a larger number of people have come to understand the objections to assisted suicide in principle and the problems with this bill in practice, as the debate has moved on. The contribution of Catholics, working with others, has been crucial here, and I reiterate my thanks for all you have done. Sometimes we maybe disheartened, but our pro-life works makes a difference, and it can draw people to the faith.

The Bill is now in the House of Lords. It had its First Reading on June 23rd and [passed] its Second Reading on the 12th of September. The Lords dedicated two days to the debate, after which it will be debated in a committee of the whole house. The Lords will debate amendments and vote on the Bill, a process that could take us to autumn or beyond. They may send the Bill back to the House of Commons with amendments, in which case the House of Commons will vote on these amendments. The Bill might be passed back and forth between the Houses. For the bill to become law, the process needs to end within this Parliamentary session, which is likely to close in Spring 2026.

As you well know, the Church and other voices oppose this Bill in principle, recognising that life cannot be ended by choice. Others oppose it in practice and argue this Bill is bad legislation. There are a number of particularly problematic and dangerous areas in the Bill for the Church and others:

(1) First, there is concern about capacity and the full consent of the person who is terminally ill to end their life. There is the danger of pressure, whether from family or friends, whether the motivation is freedom from suffering or more sinister in terms of seizing assets. We are becoming more aware of the problem of “coercive control” whereby people(normally women) are, over a long period of time, manipulated by somebody they love and trust. There is no effective way to deal with this problem in an assisted suicide bill.

(2) A second concern is about the protection of conscience. The Catholic Medical Association (CMA) has led on this topic. Whilst it has been suggested that doctors will not have to act against their conscience with regards to the provision of assisted suicide, Clause 5.6 clearly states: “A registered medical practitioner who is unwilling or unable to conduct the preliminary discussion” must ensure that the “person is directed to where they can obtain information and have the preliminary discussion” (emphasis added). This clause does not confer the rights we should expect in exercising conscientious objection, nor the right to object on other grounds. Directing the person in this manner constitutes significant assistance and co-operation with the act of assisted suicide, which would be morally unacceptable to many medical practitioners. Further, the Equalities Impact Assessment in relation to religion as a protected characteristic is woeful. It merely restates the Bill’s provisions, while failing to address both the effectiveness of protections for those unwilling to participate in the act or process of assisted suicide. There are other concerns about the involvement of doctors, which can be read instatements made on the bishops’ website.

(3) Third, there is a particular concern for the freedom of institutions, including Catholic care homes and hospices. We must distinguish the two cases. Most hospice care takes place for a significant length of time at home; only at the last stages is it likely for a person to move to the hospice. In this situation, it may be unlikely that a person would choose to go to the hospice and then end their life. However, itis a possibility and, at present, there is no provision for institutional freedom in the Bill – a Catholic hospice which rejects assisted suicide as a practice would not, as the proposed legislation stands, be able to prevent a person from requesting to end their life by assisted suicide or prevent staff from acceding to that request. Similarly, in a care home, where a person is often a long-term resident, the legislation does not permit institutional freedom and so the care home would have to comply with requests for assisted suicide. This restriction of freedom is a direct threat to the Catholic care sector. We may be pushed out of this sector of care, which would be terrible. It also raises disturbing questions about the effect of such practices on staff who are fundamentally opposed to assisted suicide – including domiciliary care staff visiting people in their own homes, who are often Christian or Muslim. It has been argued that it could cause moral injury, and this can be further examined. There is sound argument, both in principle and economically, for an institutional freedom which we seek. Previous analysis estimates that if faith-based and principled care organisations exit the sector, the cost to the public purse would be £8.4 billion annually, just for care costs excluding regime change and emergency provision and other, for example, legal costs. These organisations provide high-quality care at lower cost, often subsidised by charitable donations and volunteer support.

The Threat at the beginning of life

On June 17, 2025, the UK House of Commons voted to pass the amendment by Tonia Antoniazzi to the Crime and Policing Bill by 379 votes to 137. The amendment decriminalises abortion up to birth for women in England and Wales. This is a danger to both women and, of course, to their babies. A different amendment by Stella Creasy MP, which would have led to full decriminalisation of abortion, was not debated. There was also an amendment which would require the reintroduction of in-person consultations for abortion within the pills-by-post scheme, which did not pass.

The amended bill is now in the House of Lords. The date of the Second Reading in the House of Lords is 16^th October. On June 10th, I published a statement opposing the amendments, and urging the faithful to contact their MPs, via an e-action tool on the CBCEW website. An article by Secretariat staff member Adelaide Di Maggio on the dangers of abortion decriminalisation was published on the Tablet blog.

The Bishops’ Conference Secretariat and I sent a letter to the Health Minister Baroness Merron in early September to ascertain what the Government’s position is on potential policy change on embryo experimentation, and to ask for a meeting. She responded that it is not part of current government plans [policy] to change the legislation at this time, which permits experimentation on human embryos up to 14 days. Of course, many scientists argue for a widening of experimentation. We consider this an arbitrary time limit and would argue that the human embryo should be protected from conception. Many committed Catholic PhD students and researchers find themselves excluded from areas of research because of the UK legislation.

In summary, the Church’s teaching finds friends with some evangelical Christians, many Muslims, and some people of other faiths and none. This leads me to ask what are the major societal and cultural factors which dominate discourse.

The trend and challenge

Last Friday, I visited a secondary school in the archdiocese. I was walking past a Year 11 class and noticed that the subject under discussion was about the end of life. On the whiteboard, there was an explanation about the difference between assisted suicide and euthanasia– of course, the difference is who administers the lethal dose: in the first case, the person themselves; in the second, the doctor or professional (e.g. as in the Netherlands). I asked to go in. I commented that I was the Lead Bishop for Life and that this topic was of profound interest to me. I raised the Leadbeater legislation and asked how many would vote ‘No’ – a few hands; I asked who would vote ‘Yes’ – many hands. The teacher said they were beginning to explore the topic. I said it should be an interesting discussion. I suggest this would be the common reaction of many 16-year-olds. They have been shaped by a culture where choice, my choice, is the dominant value. I determine my life by what I choose; yes, but on what basis are the choices made? Catholics understand that they choose according to what is right or wrong based on objective criteria, and this leads to moral good or sin.

Choice or autonomy (auto + nomos =self-law, from Greek) determines my life project by my choices. It is a very existential approach to life. Choice dominates narrative (‘my right’, ‘it’s my choice’)to have an abortion or to end my life.

What are dominant understandings or world views that shape such a choice? For many, the language used is ‘I feel itis right’– this can be a gut feeling of right or wrong (often shaped by law or cultural values), or a view that morality is purely what I decide is right or wrong according to my feelings. This view can be described as emotivism and was strongly critiqued by Alasdair MacIntyre in his seminal book After Virtue. Macintyre argued that much of common morality is based on feeling. Yet a society puts limits on choices. Everyone agrees that exploitation of children is wrong, enshrines it in law, and sentences those who break the law. So, morality cannot ever be just based on feeling. However, often it is based on giving people the maximum to freedom to choose as they wish and only limiting when harm is done. But the understanding of harm is limited because it fails to see the dignity of the embryo or the developing child in the womb. A child with disability can be aborted up to birth but a child born with disability has equal worth. There is something very wrong here. Indeed, when it comes to abortion, the whole idea of choice and autonomy falls away as a rationale as soon as it is realised that, scientifically speaking, an unborn baby is another human being. We do not have the right to kill another human being.

St John Paul II made a harsh critique of this view of emotivism and choice in his encyclical Veritatis Splendora(written in 1993, over 30 years ago). He said that emotions are insufficient as a basis for morality; rather, the moral law is based on the truth of the objective order which is open to human reason about what is good or bad, and confirmed by revelation in the scriptures and tradition. There is a truth to the order of the world in which every person, from conception to natural death, has an inherent dignity which must be respected.

He also was critical of understandings of being a person that separate the body and the spirit. We hear this in views about gender by those who argue that one’s gender is chosen and follows social conventions rather than being inherent in nature in being a man or a woman.

To separate the body and the spirit was an early heresy in the Church. The Manicheans (once, St Augustine followed them)argued that the body was bad and the spirit was good. The good spirit had to be liberated from the evil body and set free for God. To disregard the body makes us free-floating spirits. This is not Christian teaching, because Jesus Christ, true God and true Man, became flesh and took on a human body in the flesh. By assuming our flesh, he sanctified it and redeemed it. We are saved as body and spirit, and this must be accepted. As man or woman, we have a body, DNA and agender. Admittedly, there are some people who struggle with their gender identity, but this does not deny the objective order as created by God (Genesis 1:28).

A new narrative

I propose that we need to help people rediscover the gift of life and the interconnectedness of all reality.

Life is a gift given by God. The human response to a gift is gratitude and praise, Can we help people to rediscover the gift of human life? Adam and Eve rejoiced before the Fall and recognised that God’s creation is described as ‘very good’. We praise God for his wonders in the Psalms, e.g. Psalm 8:

When I consider your heavens,
    the work of your fingers,
  the moon and the stars,
    which you have set in place,
⁴ what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
   human beings that you care for them?^[c]

⁵ You have made them^[d] a little lower than the angels^[e]
    and crowned them^[f] with glory and honor.
⁶ You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
    you put everything under their^[g] feet:
⁷ all flocks and herds,
    and the animals of the wild,
⁸ the birds in the sky,
    and the fish in the sea,
    all that swim the paths of the seas.

⁹ Lord, our Lord,
    how majestic is your name in all the earth!

Or Psalm 139: 13ff:

For it was you who formed my inward parts;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you, or I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
    Wonderful are your works;
that I know very well.
¹⁵  My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
    intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written
    all the days that were formed for me,
    when none of them as yet existed.
¹⁷ How weighty tome are your thoughts, O God!
    How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
    I come to the end^[a]—I am still with you.

Mary rejoiced in the birth of Jesus and the angels sang their song of praise. From giftedness arises gratitude and generosity. St Francis recognised the gift of life and sang of brother sun and sister moon, brother wind and sister water, brother fire, sister Mother earth, and sister Bodily death: ‘Praise and bless my Lord, and give Him thanks and serve Him with great humility.’

He recognised the interconnectedness of all reality and the relationship of earth and human, body and spirit; all was created to praise God. I suggest that, if we could rediscover the giftedness of life and the interconnectedness of all reality including the child in the womb, we would be more contemplative and see the creation with eyes of awe and wonder. The mystery of conception, the good of sexuality, the beauty of unborn life developing in the womb, and the time of death would all be part of caring for and stewarding the gift of creation given by God. I think it would begin to shape our actions, since our morals come from the stories we tell ourselves and hear from others.

This Franciscan understanding was presented by Pope Francis in his encyclical Laudato Si’ (2015, ten years ago). Everything is ‘interconnected’ and connected to every other part of creation. As we listen to the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor, we also listen to the cry of the unborn child in the womb, a voice that cannot be heard but is felt by the mother, all is part of the interconnectedness of all reality. The Pope writes, ‘Since everything is interrelated, concern for the protection of nature is also incompatible with the justification of abortion. How can we genuinely teach the importance of concern for other vulnerable beings, however troublesome or inconvenient they may be, if we fail to protect a human embryo, even when its presence is uncomfortable and creates difficulties? “If personal and social sensitivity towards the acceptance of the new life is lost, then other forms of acceptance that are valuable for society also wither away”.’ [Laudato Si’ 120; Caritas in Veritate 51].

This understanding invites our reflection on the set of relationships between persons and with the whole of creation. It includes our relationships between women and men, with the unborn child, and the elderly. It includes the gift of sexual dignity, marriage, family, the world of work and all social and economic relationships.  Rights are not just about our freedoms but respect the nature of who we are as persons. From this understanding flows our duties towards the vulnerable and those who cannot defend themselves.

The profound loss of understanding of the gift of unborn life, and its connectedness to all of reality. is at the heart of many of our social challenges. Yet it is not totally lost; for this reason, women agonise about abortion but often many cannot see alternatives.

We have not only to face the terrible reality of almost 10 million legal abortions in this country but also address the conditions which lead to abortion. The interconnectedness of all reality makes us reflect on violence which destroys human relationships, especially sexual and domestic violence. This interconnectedness also makes us reflect on poverty and housing. There is a task of education to build mutual and loving respectful relationships. A study of the many factors which lead to abortion is needed to begin to address the reasons for this number.

In Conclusion

Thank you for your opposition and work to communicate and help defeat legislation against the good of life. However, longer term, we are called to engage in catechesis which respects the good of human life and the connection to all of reality. Creation, life and relationships are connected. To recognise this is God’s gift is the beginning of new understanding and new actions. Perhaps you might feel inclined to go back to your parishes and think about actions you can take, and new mechanisms of pastoral support, which will help people better understand the gift of life from conception to natural death and better support those who struggle with the realities of unplanned pregnancies, miscarriage, disability and old age. Like this, we can rebuild our culture from the bottom up.

+John Sherrington

Archbishop of Liverpool

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