A Swiss federal court ruling is forcing a Christian-run nursing home to allow assisted suicides at its facility, World Radio reports.
The Salvation Army, which runs a nursing home in Neuchatel, Switzerland, recently challenged a Swiss law that requires all health care facilities to allow assisted suicides on their premises if a patient requests it, according to the report. The Christian group argued that the law violates its religious beliefs and freedom of conscience.
However, the federal court ruled against the Christian charity last week. The judges said the law gives individuals the power to decide when and how they want to die, according to the report. The judges said the only other option for the Salvation Army is to give up its charitable status and state subsidies; if it does, the nursing home would not have to comply.
Religious freedom and conscience protections for medical professionals and facilities are eroding across the world as abortion and euthanasia advocates push to force religious groups to provide the deadly procedures.
In the U.S., the American Civil Liberties Union has filed several lawsuits attempting to force Catholic health care groups to provide or refer for abortions. In March, LifeNews reported the ACLU sued the Trinity Health Corporation, a Catholic hospital group, because its doctors refused to do abortions. The liberal legal group also sued a Catholic hospital in Michigan on behalf of a woman who claimed the hospital failed to present abortion as an option when her water broke at 18 weeks of pregnancy. A federal court rejected the lawsuit.
In California and Illinois, conscience protection rights also are under attack.
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner signed a law in July amending the state Health Care Right of Conscience Act to require medical professionals in all capacities to refer patients for abortions and counsel them on what the legislation calls the “benefits” of abortion. Those who do not comply could face penalties. Pro-life pregnancy centers and doctors recently filed a lawsuit challenging the law.
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Pro-life pregnancy centers are in a similar battle in California. The radical, pro-abortion law backed by NARAL took effect in December, forcing more than 150 pro-life non-profits to choose between advertising free and low-cost abortions through the state or facing heavy fines if they do not comply.
The California pregnancy centers are seeking relief through lawsuits, but none has come thus far. Last December, two judges refused to temporarily block the pro-abortion law from taking effect, LifeNews reported.
In August, the Los Angeles Times reported city lawyers threatened to take legal action against the Pregnancy Counseling Center in Mission Hills after it refused to follow the pro-abortion law. City attorney Mike Feuer took initial steps to file a lawsuit against the pro-life center after it missed an Aug. 14 deadline to correct violations, according to the report.
The pro-life non-profit eventually submitted to the pro-abortion law. Failure to do so could have subjected the pregnancy center to huge penalties of $2,500 per day, the newspaper reported.
In July, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a key pro-life bill in response to another troubling regulation in California that requires churches and other religious institutions to to pay for abortions in their employee health care plans.
The troubling situation began in 2014 when the California Department of Managed Health Care reclassified abortion as a “basic health service” under the Affordable Care Act and ordered all insurance plans in the state to begin covering surgical abortions immediately. Even churches are not exempt from funding abortions.
The federal Conscience Protection Act would address the situation in California by protecting the conscience rights of pro-life Americans so they are not forced to be involved with abortions by either paying for them or being required to assist in them as medical workers.
