Two days before the demonstration, the end-of-life assistance law is forced through

Context

We had followed every step of this legislative marathon since its resumption in January 2026: the failed motion of rejection, the vote on the first article, the alerts from the SFAP, the words of Archbishop Aveline, the reservations of Bayrou. Four days remain. The solemn vote in the National Assembly is scheduled for June 30, 2026. In the meantime, on June 28, the streets will speak.

The Facts

The national demonstration against assisted dying is called for Saturday, June 28, 2026, at Place Fontenoy in Paris, at 4:00 PM. Alliance Vita, the French Society for Palliative Care and Support (SFAP), SOS Bébés, and Les Survivants are calling for participation. The bill has been locked down by the majority: no substantial amendments have been accepted. Several healthcare organizations maintain their principled opposition. Three left-wing MPs have joined the opponents in the final stretch. The parliamentary procedure has been described in the press as "a law by forceps": the majority used the rules of procedure to limit debate and sideline dissenting voices.

Doctrinal Analysis

Evangelium Vitae by John Paul II is unambiguous: "Euthanasia is a grave violation of the law of God, inasmuch as it is the deliberate killing of a human person" (EV, n. 65). The Catechism of the Catholic Church specifies: "An act or omission which, of itself or by intention, causes death in order to eliminate suffering constitutes a murder gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, its Creator" (CCC, n. 2277). The French law under preparation, whatever terminology is used—assisted dying, medically assisted death—falls into this moral category. Changing the name does not change the act.

Stakes for the Church and the Faithful

For the faithful engaged in palliative care, this law creates a formidable moral pressure: the risk of being forced, within the institution where they work, to refer a patient to a protocol they deem gravely wrong. The conscience clause—if maintained in the final text—will constitute the first legal safeguard. But its real scope remains uncertain, and European precedents (Belgium, the Netherlands) show that it erodes over time. The stakes are also symbolic: a society that legalizes the deliberate killing of its most vulnerable members says something about its vision of humanity.

Critical Reading and Blind Spots

Citizen mobilization is real and broader than in 2005 (the Leonetti debate). But the Belgian experience, cited by all opponents, shows that euthanasia laws, once passed, never retreat—they expand. The initial safeguards (terminal illness, unbearable suffering) fall one after another, decade after decade. The issue on June 30 is therefore not just another vote: it is an anthropological threshold that France is about to cross.

To Reflect and Act

Join the demonstration on June 28 at Place Fontenoy at 4:00 PM. Reread Evangelium Vitae, n. 65-77, and circulate it in your parishes and families. Support the SFAP in its fight to develop palliative care as a credible and humane alternative to euthanasia. And pray: that France may find the courage to choose life.