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Befriending Death?

Home News Befriending Death?
Comment

June 2025

Life beyond the changing landscape of the progression of legislation to legalise assisted dying.

by James Woodward

Shaped by history and conviction

I had the privilege to be part of The Commission on Assisted Dying over 2010 at 2011. It was chaired skilfully by Lord Charles Falconer and supported by the staff of Demos. As I entered the work I was asked how I would position myself theologically and politically. I replied that I thought I was basically a “liberal progressive”. Why? It was because I have been passionate about the issues of social justice, equality and freedom of expression. These questions and experiences have shaped my ministry and engagement as priest, pastor and practical theologian.

In the late 1980s I stood, alongside others, at the early stages of the AIDS pandemic. I believe I was a pioneering advocate for more serious theological reflection on the profound moral and social problems posed by the spread of the HIV virus. I argued then and maintain an even stronger sense now, that theology can grow and mature through a genuine engagement with the physical realities of human sexuality, suffering and mortality which the virus brought so sharply into focus.

Another interest and commitment over these decades of ministry has been health and well-being. As a hospital chaplain in Birmingham during the introduction of general management and the internal market it seems to me then that there are serious dangers of commodifying the organisation of health. I detect a little bit of headstrong commentary in some of what I wrote during that time. However, the challenge for us to think about the ways in which we build responsibility for healthy lives and communities persists. This is a cultural question but also an economic one that lies at the heart of how we organise society to be equitable and fair especially for those who have less agency and choice.

A natural progressive step?

So why against this background of a commitment to progressiveness am I so disturbed by Friday’s vote by the House of Commons to agree to legalise, albeit under certain defined circumstances, assistance at the end of life. At 2:14 pm the House of Commons divided and agreed by 314 votes to 291 that the bill should be read the third time and passed. It will continue its journey to becoming law after scrutiny by the House of Lords.

I have now had the opportunity to read the Hansard record of the debate. I saw some of it via livestream and was moved alongside others to hear many personal stories of pain and suffering. It was a good-tempered debate with the only frustration being the inevitable restriction on contributions due to limited time.

So, I ask myself again why it is I remain so disquieted by this majority vote albeit by a very slim margin? Is this not the very triumph of progressive liberalism?

First, in the politics of campaigning and positioning in this area there has been a dominance of any attempt to explore what some commentators have described as a common ground. Politics is a contest of ideas and winning a political argument so often lacks intellectual curiosity and can be very far removed from the communities and people it seeks to serve. We make far too many assumptions about what we think people really want. We are not good at forging coalitions. We are ambivalent to ambiguity where there may not be easy solutions. Too often most of us fail to listen carefully to experience. Do we understand what it is that gives meaning and purpose to the narratives of our lives. How do we work with and across the barriers of difference? What kind of story do we want to tell of our lives together today?  In other words, we too often fail to engage with the world as it is rather seeking solace in abstract and often vacuous values that leave wealth, power and status unchanged. It is no wonder that systems, some narratives and politics have lost people’s trust.

What is our ethical vision?

Some commentators have made a plea for us to engage in a deeper public philosophy so that there can be a rebuilding of connection and coalition around an ethical vision. Such ethical vision built deeply into the Christian tradition fuses transformation with reconciliation. The Church of England is episcopally led and synodically governed. This may have shaped the way we do theology together and make decisions especially in the area of complex social and ethical issues. How committed are we to nurturing a generative theology and a deeper vision that can see beyond factional interests in search of holding and exercising power? Synodical agendas and order papers may be necessary for nurturing democracy, but they do not take us deeper into wisdom.

A personal lens

I live in the aftermath of a universal human experience which is the death of parents, close relatives and lifelong friends. My mother died after a long and painful struggle with dementia looked after by my father and my siblings. My father died suddenly from heart failure several years later. I often wonder what they would have said about this legislation. They were realistic about the limitations and challenges of growing older but each in their own way faced them with courage and fortitude and good humour. We never make judgments with absolute objectivity. That is part of the complexity and indeed messiness of how we live. I cannot expect my own experience to be a template or complete guide for ethical thinking or public policy. However I can choose to consider how my life story shapes several of my views which will inevitably be a mixture of impression, feelings and an attempt to be objective. How far and to what extent any of us can impose our worldview shaped as they are  through our personal lens is worth considering in this debate and other areas of our social and political lives.

I am deeply uneasy about what has happened though not surprised because there was an inevitability about this bill and its movement into law.  However, there are questions that remain for us all.

The limits of compassion

We need to be careful about the constant use of the word compassion which is very prevalent in the debate last Friday in the House of Commons. There was a great deal of feeling for those who are suffering and that is a virtue of our human nature. Compassion however does not tell us what is right. Compassion does not help us weigh up an individual good and need over and above the way in which society affirms the essential worth and dignity of every human being whatever the state of health. A stress on compassion is inevitable and important but it is not a good basis upon which to make a judgement about the implications of this changing legislation about our understanding of human personhood, the nature of pain and our responsibility to nurture moral and ethical safeguards.

However I have come to see the power of those individuals who told their stories about their journey with unbearable pain at the end of their lives. I know those who have battled for a change in the law believe in the essential worth and dignity of every human being and this legislation is compassionate as it helps individuals choose to end their lives with trust and hope. The debates and the legislation are sometimes too binary to be able to explore this shared geography of care for human beings living with unbearable pain.

Dignitas

As part of my work over 15 years ago with the Commission I visited the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland. It helped me shape the view, since informed and developed by others, that we need to consider more imaginatively the way a culture views and values life, death and the freedom to choose. We need to engage further with social and ethical reflections on experiences of death and dying. Law and medicine are not enough. While I admire the way in which there has been a carefully organised political and legal responses from the churches we need to work further and deeper into opening some of the theological questions that this crossroads decision presents us with.

What I experienced in the Dignitas clinic was essentially a safe space within which very vulnerable people were being engaged with carefully and compassionately. What was clear was that their loved ones deeply wanted the very best care and pain relief at the end of life.

Palliative Care

We need also to strengthen our commitment to supporting the development of palliative care. I remain unconvinced the UK health and social care system is quite in a place to be able to handle the process is as outlined in the bill. I hope that the second chamber will exercise more scrutiny of some of the pastoral and practical elements of how assistance at the end of life would be delivered.

Human resilience for affirming life and death

It is my psychological conviction that there is no stage of human life at no level of human experience that is intrinsically incapable of being lived through in some kind of trust and hope. I do not want to idealise or romanticise human pain but there are many people who embrace experiences of helplessness and pain in a way which can be meaningful and communicates dignity and assurance. I wonder what spiritual framework and signposts will help us in taking the sheer wonder and diversity of human beings and their experience seriously. Can we provide the space and security in which we can be honest? In my own professional terms, we need a theology of life and death that notice just who we are.

During the public and political debates that have taken place over the many years since my participation in the Commission I have felt that in this highly functional world of ours we so often overlook our relationship with time. I wonder whether we have really listened to or enabled others to share different stories of life and death? Where do we go to for us to understand at a deeper level our mortality? Who will guide us on this pathway? Where will we look for our story to be held and heard?

Conclusions

It may be that I am raging against the tide which is only moving in one direction and so I need to move my narrative on in the face of change and progressiveness. I hope that some attention will be given to safeguards especially for vulnerable people in the legislation. Above all I hope we can create a health service capable of handling such complex and difficult experiences and decisions. Most fundamentally I hope that we shall be able to nurture some theological narrative that can help people understand how and where they are in this fast flowing river.

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James Woodward is Principal of Sarum College. View his bio

James is leading an online discussion about the assisted dying debate from 1pm to 4pm on 1 July 2025. Details and to book

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