Catholic Sisters challenge New York state assisted suicide law.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Madeleine Long reported in The Free Press on July 17, 2026 that several orders of Catholic sisters are challenging the New York assisted suicide law. This law requires the sisters to inform their patients that they can have assisted suicide and the New York law conflicts with the federal law which prohibits federal funding for assisted suicide.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed the assisted suicide bill into law in February which will take effect on August 5, 2026.

Long reported that:

A coalition of Catholic healthcare providers filed suit in federal court in Albany on Friday, arguing that New York’s new assisted dying law would force them to choose between their faith and their ability to provide care for the sick, the elderly, and the dying.

The lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of New York, names 13 plaintiffs, including multiple congregations of nuns such as the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm, and the Little Sisters of the Poor. The Diocese of Rockville Centre and Catholic Health, a network of five Long Island hospitals, are also named.

Long explains how the law contravenes the federal law prohibiting funding for assisted suicide:

The law works in tandem with an existing New York statute, the Palliative Care Information Act, which requires doctors and nurse practitioners to inform terminally ill patients of all their end-of-life options. Now that assisted dying is one of them, medical professionals must proactively raise it with patients—whether or not the patient asks.Catholic healthcare has always refused to participate in assisting suicides.

Long further explains that:

The lawsuit asks the court to declare the Medical Aid in Dying Act unconstitutional and block its enforcement before it takes effect next month. At its core, the complaint argues the law violates the First Amendment by compelling doctors and nurses at religious facilities to counsel patients about assisted dying and by interfering with the Church’s ability to govern its own healthcare institutions. It also states that the law conflicts with federal statutes prohibiting the use of federal healthcare funds for assisted dying—a claim that applies to several plaintiffs who receive Medicare and Medicaid funding.

Noncompliance carries significant consequences, according to the complaint, including civil penalties of up to $2,000 per violation, potential loss of operating licenses, and criminal liability resulting in up to a year in prison for willful violations.

New York’s law includes a provision permitting religious facilities to opt out of prescribing or administering lethal drugs on their premises. But according to the sisters’ lawyers, the opt-out is among the narrowest in the nation, narrower than similar laws in California, Oregon, and Washington, where religious providers can opt out of all participation if their faith requires it.It is important to note that Catholic healthcare is challenging their obligation to participate in assisting a suicide as well as they are challenging the use of federal money for assisting a suicide.

EPC believes that the court should recognize the conscience rights of care-givers and strike down the law based on federal assisted suicide funding restrictions.

For those who believe that assisted suicide is a choice, then they should also acknowledge the choice of others to not participate in assisted suicide. Participation is wider than the actual act of prescribing or directly assisting the suicide.

Further to that, assisted suicide is not about "autonomy" since it requires the direct involvement of medical professionals who are complicit with a person's suicide.

Medical professionals should never be involved with killing or assisting suicides since it changes the nature of care. For ethical healthcare to survive, there must be a commitment to always care and never kill.

More articles on this topic:

• New York is opening a pandora's box with assisted suicide (Link). 
• New York Governor to sign assisted suicide bill (Link).