SPEAKING ACROSS NORTH AMERICA AGAINST EUTHANASIA (MASSACHUSETTS)

Boston State House

Eighteen years ago, I spoke before a senate judiciary committee of the Massachusetts state legislature as they considered an assisted suicide bill. I warned the senators that legalizing assisted suicide would put in peril the lives of people with severe disabilities. 

                                 
The senators were stunned that a disabled man from western Canada would travel thousands of miles to Boston to appear before them. Happily, the bill was later defeated and assisted suicide remains illegal in Massachusetts to this day. 

                                                                    

Me addressing a Fall River MA
conference. Notice sitting beside me
 was Bishop Sean O'Malley, later to
become Cardinal and Archbishop of Boston

After hearing my testimony before the senators, the Respect Life office of the Catholic diocese of Fall River, MA, asked me back to Massachusetts to appear at their annual conference. As you can see from the photograph, I was still able to stand with the aid of a cane. A scooter was also used to move about because walking was getting difficult. (MS is degenerative.)                                  

I had no idea then that within 20 years assisted suicide would come to my own country.