With a communiqué released on 13 July, Cardinal Karl Lehmann, President of the German Bishops’ Conference, welcomed the position published by the German national Ethical Council on death and the relation with the terminally ill. “We approve the fact that the national Council, by condemning the instigation to suicide as ethically deplorable and rejecting every form of the accompaniment of death aimed at profit, has unanimously expressed its view that death on request is punishable under law, and consequently should be banned”, says the communiqué. “However, it is striking that unanimity was not reached among the Council’s members on many other questions and that the ethical and legal motivations were expressed from very different points of view and evaluations. […] We deplore the fact that it proved impossible to reach greater consensus on many important questions”. “The proposal publicly to tolerate or actively to promote institutionalised assistance in suicide must be decisively rejected”, declared Lehmann. “Accepting such offers would be to subvert society’s task to safeguard those at risk of suicide: it would give to suicide the semblance of normality and of being socially acceptable”, the cardinal explained. “It is the task of everyone”, he continued, “to reinforce the trust of the terminally ill in the assistance due to them. This support must be something the terminally ill can rely on and be guaranteed also through the law and medical assistance…. Self-determination, autonomy and independence at the end of existence cannot be opposed to assistance, support and the need for sufficient medical treatment, presence and dedication”.
