Christian healthcare providers protected from assisted suicide law under court order
October 13, 2026
A U.S. District judge has ruled that nearly all healthcare providers affiliated with Catholic and Christian healthcare institutions in Illinois are protected from having to provide assisted suicide or refer patients for it as litigation over the state’s new assisted-suicide mandate continues.
The Christian Post reports that last week, U.S. District Judge Franklin Valderrama of the Northern District of Illinois expanded an earlier order barring Illinois officials from enforcing the End-of-Life Options for Terminally Ill Patients Act and parts of the Health Care Right of Conscience Act against several plaintiffs.
The expanded order protects the original plaintiffs, including Bishop Thomas Paprocki of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield, the Lutheran Care Center and several Catholic physicians.
The order also covers all members of the Illinois Catholic Health Association, the Christian Medical & Dental Associations, the National Association of Catholic Nurses and the Catholic Psychotherapy Association.
Those associations joined the lawsuit through an amended complaint filed Sept. 10, after Valderrama’s first order covering the original plaintiffs and just before the law was set to take effect, according to the Christian Post.
Last month, Valderrama issued a separate order barring Illinois officials from enforcing the same laws against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, a Catholic pharmacist and groups of Catholic nuns.
The Thomas More Society, which represents the plaintiffs, said in a statement last week, that the order bars Illinois from enforcing the law “against any member of numerous religious health care associations, including the Illinois Catholic Health Association, whose Catholic hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living centers, and pharmacies represent more than 95% of Catholic health care institutions in the state.”
Peter Breen, Thomas More Society’s executive vice president and head of litigation, said Catholic and Christian health care providers, including hospitals, nursing homes, physicians, nurses and therapists, seek to “heal” not “harm.”
Breen added, “This order lifts that threat for nearly every Catholic health care institution in the state and for the members of the state’s largest Catholic and Christian medical associations. We will keep fighting until that protection is permanent.”
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