In a case with implications for religious freedom, institutional autonomy, and health care access across Canada, a British Columbia Supreme Court trial will consider whether faith-based hospitals can be forced to provide euthanasia on site. Source: CNA.
The case arises from the death of a terminally ill woman who sought medical assistance in dying (MAID) while receiving care at St Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver.
Because St Paul’s is a Catholic facility that does not provide assisted suicide, the patient was transferred to another health care facility that offered MAID.
Her family and co-plaintiffs allege the transfer caused “unnecessary pain and distress” and argue that the policy allowing faith-based facilities to opt out of MAID violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The co-defendants in the case are the Providence Health Care Society, the Catholic denominational authority that operates St Paul’s and 16 other facilities, the BC Ministry of Health and the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority.
Trial proceedings began yesterday and are scheduled to run until February 6.
While the legality of MAID itself is not being challenged, the court must decide whether publicly funded, faith-based hospitals can maintain MAID-free spaces or whether the state’s duty to provide access overrides institutional conscience rights.
Central to the defence is a 1995 Master Agreement between the BC government and denominational health providers.
The agreement formally recognises the right of faith-based facilities to preserve the spiritual nature of the facility and governs how services incompatible with a facility’s religious identity are handled, typically through transfer rather than on-site provision.
Supporters of the current system argue that this pluralistic model protects the diversity of care available to British Columbians.
In 2023, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops released a statement reiterating its opposition to euthanasia in Catholic hospitals.
Vancouver Archbishop Michael Miller noted that the bishops had already drawn a line in the sand at their September plenary meeting, when they unanimously stated that MAID would not be delivered in Catholic hospitals.
Conversely, the BC Humanist Association has called for the provincial government to “tear up” the 1995 Master Agreement, arguing that it undermines the government’s duty of religious neutrality.
FULL STORY
British Columbia Supreme Court to hear challenge over euthanasia at faith-based hospitals (Canadian Catholic News via CNA)
