Spain’s Catholic bishops have condemned the legalisation of euthanasia in the country yesterday. Doctors have also attacked the move, which will allow people to avail of the procedure even when they are not dying.

The country’s parliament approved the law 202 to 141, and it will go into effect in three months.

Once the law is applied, anyone over the age of 18 who suffers “a grave and incurable” disease, or “serious, chronic and incapacitating condition” that affects autonomy and that generates “constant and intolerable physical or psychological suffering” can choose to end their life.

“Unfortunately, they’ve tried to find a solution to avoid suffering, by inducing the death of someone who is suffering,” said Bishop Luis Argüello, secretary general of the Spanish bishops’ conference.

The bishop added this is also a time for the Catholic Church to remind Spanish society that “you will not willingly cause the death of person to alleviate suffering, but on the contrary, you will care for, practice tenderness, closeness, mercy, [inspire] encouragement [and] hope for those people who are in the final stretch of their existence, perhaps in moments of suffering that need comfort, care and hope.”

Argüello said this is time for “promoting a culture of life and taking concrete steps promoting a living will or advance declarations that make it possible for Spanish citizens to express their desire to receiving palliative care in a clear and determined way: Their desire not to be subject to the application of this euthanasia law.”

Manuela Garcia Romero, deputy head of the Medical College Organisation (OMC), expressed doubts over implementation of the law. He said:  “Doctors don’t want anyone to die – it’s in their DNA”.

The US and countries in Europe have been asked to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to Syria on the tenth anniversary of the start of the war.

The call came from the International charity, Aid to the Church in Need.

Executive President, Dr. Thomas Heine-Geldern said there is a duty to provide help to the suffering civil population of Syria – and especially to the rapidly dwindling Christian minority.

“In their name I beg you to implement the existing international legal framework, which allows humanitarian exceptions to the embargo.”

Syria is currently under sanction by the international community. There are provisions for humanitarian aid to be allowed into Syria under the sanctions, but according to ACN the mechanism is not working properly. The system makes it extremely difficult to transfer money to Syria and also to deliver humanitarian related goods.

Dr. Heine-Geldren calls on the international community to clarify what is permitted under the sanctions and what is not, and to also  facilitate the provision of aid to the war-torn Middle Eastern country. In  addition he calls for a clearer and easier permitting system for relevant NGOs. Since the beginning of the Syrian Civil War, Aid to the Church in Need has given almost €42 million in aid to help more than 900 humanitarian and pastoral programmes run by the Church in Syria.

Northern Ireland’s four main Churches will return to public worship in time for Easter.

The Catholic Church will begin a “cautious” return from Friday March 26th, allowing liturgies for Palm Sunday and all of Holy Week.

The Church of Ireland, Methodist and Presbyterian Churches will resume in-person services on Good Friday, the 2nd April.

The announcement comes after First Minister Arlene Foster confirmed a relaxation of coronavirus restrictions across the North.

The four Churches had voluntarily suspended in-person gatherings in January due to the Covid-19 lockdown.

The Catholic Bishops said the resumption would be done carefully, emphasising a “need for continued caution and a rigorous application of all mitigations and safeguards required to ensure the safest possible return to public worship in our Churches”.

The progress of a Bill in Northern Ireland to remove non-fatal disability as a ground for abortion has been welcomed by pro-life groups.

On Monday evening, the Stormont Assembly voted 48 to 12 to advance the legislation to the committee stage.

Eilís Mulroy of the Pro Life Campaign said it is unjust and discriminatory that babies with a disability could be singled out for abortion.

“It sends a strong human rights message that it’s not acceptable to single out an entire category of people and seek to justify ending their lives”.

She added: “It’s a vitally important human rights measure and hopefully one that can be built on. It’s the first successful challenge to abortion legislation on the island of Ireland, so it’s a cause for hope.”

Separately, a spokesperson for the Iona Institute NI, Ms Tracey Harkin, said the campaign has been a wake-up call about the radical nature of the abortion legislation.

“It’s good that it received majority support because it’s not the type of culture the people want in Northern Ireland.

Ms Harkin is hopeful that the move will be the first step on the road to removing the abortion law in its entirety.

“We would like obviously to extend protection to as many people as possible,” she said. “We think it’s important to support any row-back on abortion legislation, but you have to bring people along with you and make our politicians realise how important this issue is.”

Limiting attendance at funerals to 10 people is “harsh and unfair”, according to the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin.

In his homily for the Feast of St Patrick, Dermot Farrell said the limit is tolerable only in the most extreme circumstances, and for the shortest possible period.

He called on the Government to increase the numbers of mourners allowed at funerals as soon as level 5 restrictions begin to be eased.

Dr Farrell said the current restriction is so stringent some people are not able to attend the funeral of their own brother or sister.

“As a matter of human dignity and fairness — but even more so as matter of wellbeing and the restoration of normality, I call on the public authorities to give assurance that the legitimate desire of people to gather responsibly and within reasonable guidelines to exercise their constitutional right to worship will be prioritised in the easing of restrictions,” he said.

The Church has no power to bless same-sex unions, according to a note published yesterday by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) with the assent of Pope Francis.

The CDF said a blessing is a sacramental and it can only be given for things “ordered to receive and express grace, according to the designs of God inscribed in creation, and fully revealed by Christ the Lord”.

“For this reason, it is not licit to impart a blessing on relationships, or partnerships, even stable, that involve sexual activity outside of marriage (i.e., outside the indissoluble union of a man and a woman open in itself to the transmission of life), as is the case of the unions between persons of the same sex”. This applies also to stable heterosexual unions which are not valid marriages, including merely civil unions contracted by Catholics after a divorce.

The note adds that the Church recalls that God Himself “never ceases to bless each of His pilgrim children in this world, because for Him ‘we are more important to God than all of the sins that we can commit’.

“But he does not and cannot bless sin: he blesses sinful man, so that he may recognize that he is part of his plan of love and allow himself to be changed by him. He in fact ‘takes us as we are, but never leaves us as we are’”.

Portugal’s Constitutional Court on Monday rejected as unconstitutional a bill approved by parliament earlier this year to allow terminally ill patients to seek assistance from a doctor to end their lives.

The decision came after the country’s recently re-elected President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa asked the court to evaluate the legislation on the grounds that it appeared to contain “excessively undefined concepts”.

Under the bill approved by parliament in January, people aged over 18 would be allowed to request assistance in dying if they were terminally ill and suffering from “lasting” and “unbearable” pain – unless they were deemed not to be mentally fit to make such a decision.

Judge Pedro Machete told a news conference the law was unconstitutional because some of the clauses posed a threat to the principle of “inviolability of life”.

In Northern Ireland, a Bill to prohibit abortion in cases of non-fatal disability passed a vote of the Assembly last night by 48 to 12.

The Severe Fetal Impairment Bill has now gone to the Health committee for further discussion.

Currently, a Westminster-imposed-law allows babies in the womb with conditions like Down syndrome to be selected for abortion at any time up to birth.

DUP MLA Paul Givan said he wants to change this to show people with disabilities are “equally valued”.

Sinead Bradley of the SDLP supported the proposal and said the issue is one of discrimination against those with disabilities.

Sinn Fein gave vocal opposition to the bill, but abstained from voting on it.

Both the DUP and Sinn Féin leaders took the unusual step of speaking in a personal capacity during the debate.

Ms O’Neill expressed “deep unease” at the “narrow focus” of the bill while Ms Foster compared the abortion of unborn babies with Down’s Syndrome with “eugenics”.

The High Court has fixed a date in June for the hearing of damages actions by a couple whose unborn child was aborted after they were wrongly told it had a “fatal foetal abnormality”.

The couple have sued, seeking damages, against various parties. These include the National Maternity Hospital (NMH), Holles Street, Dublin, and a private clinic, Merrion Fetal Health.

The defendants deny any wrongdoing. The case is expected to take several days to hear.

The proceedings were briefly mentioned before the High Court this week, when it made orders allowing a Scottish health board, which allegedly carried out some of the testing at the centre of the claims, to be added as a defendant to the parents’ separate damages actions.

One of the country’s largest egg donor programmes has closed because of concerns about its partner clinic in Ukraine.

The Rotunda IVF clinic ended its service in September because of “significant concerns” about the Ukraine clinic where donor eggs were combined with Irish sperm before embryos were frozen and sent back to Ireland for implantation.

Many couples spend more than €10,000 on the service.

Rotunda IVF said transport of sperm and embryos in and out of Ukraine had become “more complex and precarious” because of Covid-19.

The Sunday Times has learnt that three medical negligence cases have been filed against Rotunda IVF in the High Court in the past month. In one case, a couple allege the egg-donor programme had “systemic failings” and they entered that programme only after an error compromised their chances of conceiving with their own egg and sperm.

In another case, Augustus Cullen Law is representing a couple who allege their chances of conceiving were destroyed by the use of a contaminated instrument.