At this rate, New York is on track to become the 11th state to legalize assisted suicide.
In an 81-67 vote on April 29, the New York Assembly passed the Medical Aid in Dying Act (MAID). This law permits terminally ill patients to end their lives with a physician’s help. The state Senate remains just seven votes shy of advancing the bill to a floor vote. But it can’t be too shocking, can it? After all, a 2024 YouGov poll revealed that at least 72% of New Yorkers support euthanasia. In one sense, it was only a matter of time before they legalized it.
Even so, inevitability does not erase the tragedy. Because this is tragic, even if we could see it coming a mile away. Legalizing euthanasia — despite the intentionally softer label of “assisted dying” — is a grave moral failing. It frames death as a solution to pain or inconvenience. It echoes the chilling “logic” behind abortion, too, in which innocent babies’ lives are taken due to convenience, coercion, or confusion. Both practices reflect a sickening pattern: using death to erase life’s complexities.
Another pattern? Euthanasia decisions are often born of despair, made in moments of tunnel-visioned hopelessness. And they are 100% irreversible. Once a life — whether your own, a loved one’s, or an unborn child’s — is taken, it is gone forever. Some act without grasping this perpetuity; others realize it too late, left only to grapple with enduring pain and regret. The same is true of anyone who commits suicide. But suicide in itself isn’t championed as a “right” for anyone, is it? However, slap on “physician-assisted,” and it’s suddenly not only accepted but promoted.
Hypocrisy at its finest.
The New York Alliance Against Assisted Suicide understands well enough the destructive, permanent effects of assisted suicide. While other groups nationwide fight against assisted suicide, the NY Alliance happens to be facing an immediate threat on their doorstep. They see MAID for what it is: a dangerous step toward normalizing death as a commodity.
“The Medical Aid in Dying Act does not require that physicians conduct the medical examination in-person — that is, virtual assessments are allowed,” they shared on X. With this Act, “NY might become a destination for ‘suicide tourism’ — the practice of traveling to a place where [assisted suicide] is legal to end one’s life — much like Switzerland.”
Consider the words of author and physician L.S. Dugdale, in which she rightly asserted that euthanasia, and New York’s push to legalize it through MAID, “is not about dying well. It is about relieving society — government, medical systems, even families — of the responsibility to care for those who need the most help: the mentally ill, the poor, the physically disabled.” She’s right. This is not compassion. It is abandonment dressed as mercy.
When the New York State Assembly voted on the Medical Aid in Dying Act, no Republicans voted for the bill — a beacon of hope for those who cherish the sanctity of life. Meanwhile, this implies that least at 81 of the 102 Democrats voted for the bill. Assemblymember Andrew Molitor (R-Westfield) said he “cannot support legislation that legalizes the deliberate termination of life under the guise of compassion. When mental health care, palliative treatment and effective pain management are available and should be prioritized, sanctioning death as a form of relief reflects indifference — not compassion.”
Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay (R) echoed this, warning that the “legislation is severely flawed, not only in principle, but in lacking appropriate safeguards and requirements necessary to prevent abuse and misapplication.” U.S. Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) also condemned the legislation as “disgusting” and “radical,” calling it “a shameful attack on the sanctity of life and a betrayal of our most vulnerable citizens.”
Beyond New York, other states have seen through the euphemism of “assisted dying.” Kansas, for instance, passed laws criminalizing involvement in physician-assisted death, while West Virginia voted “last November to enshrine its current ban into the state constitution, with the proposition passing 50.49% to 49.56%,” as reported by The Post-Journal.
In 2024, Danielle Pimentel of Americans United for Life cut to the heart of the matter: Euthanasia is nothing less than “normalizing suicide, and it’s incentivizing individuals to end their lives.” Truly, Republican lawmakers and conservative voices are crucial in battling this deadly agenda. And yet, it’s hard not to acknowledge that Christians are the one’s who must rise as the vanguard.
As believers, we are called to champion the sacred gift of life, boldly opposing ideologies like abortion, transgenderism, and assisted suicide that defy God’s divine design. With unwavering courage, we must defend the sanctity of every soul. The New York Assembly’s push for MAID starkly rejects this divine truth, making it critical for believers to speak all the more boldly, extend genuine compassion, and fight tirelessly to protect life from conception to natural death.
The battle for life is not a mere political skirmish. It is a spiritual mandate — a divine imperative to uphold the eternal value of every human being. To stand silent as MAID — or any other such legislation — advances is to forsake our calling. It is to abandon those most vulnerable to a culture that commodifies death. It is to allow despair to be met with a prescription for annihilation. It is to neglect “the least of these.” Don’t let these things define you, dear Christian.
Be the one who upholds God’s standard and fights for His creation to choose life. Death is sweet, and only so, for the Christian called home by the Savior. Death apart from salvation is nothing short of eternal agony. Indeed, life is richest when tethered to its Author, who guides us through fires, floods, and valleys.
So, share the Good News of Christ. Offer His hope to the hopeless, radiate His light to those in darkness, and proclaim truth to those entangled in lies. Show compassion to the manipulated and deceived. To a world that says, “End your life, and your problems will go away,” declare: Turn to Christ, and leave all your cares at the foot of the cross and in the hands that bled for you. In Christ alone, no matter your story, you have hope, freedom, purpose, and, above all, true and abundant life.
This is the message the world desperately needs. So, go on. Share it.
