Emily Graves spoke with Dr Peter Saunders about Belgium, the Netherlands and England

Assisted suicide is also legal in the US States of Washington, Oregon and Vermont and it's also legal in Switzerland as well.

Emily: How will the Christian Medical Fellowship respond when these bills go through?

Peter: Christian Medical Fellowship is one of about 40 organisations involved in the alliance called Care Not Killing, which brings together faith groups, human rights groups, health care providers and disability advice groups, all to promote good care and to oppose any change in the law. We will be working in conjunction with parliamentarians and media people. We've been on the media, producing briefings and helping them oppose this law as it comes. It will be a very busy time over the next few months with that.

Emily: As Christians we look to God for his answers and we look to his word in the Bible as well. What does the Bible actually say about euthanasia?

Peter: The Bible tells us all that human beings are incredibly precious because they're made in God's image. The whole idea of being made in God's image for relationship with God is what gives us dignity and meaning and purpose. It's also linked to the Bible very closely, to, 'You should not intentionally take the life of an innocent human being'. The sixth commandment, 'You shall not kill' and Genesis nine tells us because human beings are made in the image of God we are not justified in taking the life of an innocent human being, even if it's our own life. The two ideas come together. It's only God who has got the power and authority to take human life, not us.

The Bible tells us that because human beings are precious, that we should treat them with the utmost respect and dignity and compassion. As well as opposing changes in a law that would endanger vulnerable and innocent people, Christians need to be at the forefront of providing the best possible care for people who are disabled or suffering. Certainly for Christian doctors, those who're involved in Christian Medical Fellowship, many of them went into medicine because they believed that God was calling them to show the love of Christ compassionately through good medical care and to use those skills more. It's about killing the pain and not killing the patient and it's always possible to substantially relieve symptoms that people are having; to be able to provide good care. We really believe that when people are properly looked after and I don't just mean their physical needs, but also their emotional and spiritual and social needs as well; when they're looked after as whole people then very few ever want to end their lives. We think the priority has to be to make sure that really good care is more widely accessible and that people are properly supported through disability and sickness.

Emily: As a Christian how would you respond to someone who may have the option of euthanasia or assisted suicide? How would you tell them about the message of God and his hope for them?

Peter: If you have a patient who is entertaining these questions, you first need to understand why it is that life's got so desperate that they want to end their lives. You want to find out what's prompting this request. Is it pain? Is it nausea? Is it some other symptom that could be relieved? Or is it something bigger, of what we call an existential question; that they've lost hope, meaning or purpose and that's often the case. We know that wanting to end ones life is not necessarily linked to our physical illness at all. In fact most suicides here in the UK are related to mental illness or to depression or loss of meaning and purpose; broken relationships, alcohol and drug abuse those kinds of things. It's also being able to address those questions.

It strikes me about this debate; you can have two patients who have pretty much exactly the same kind of condition and the same kind of symptoms. One of them wants 'assisted living', help to live with dignity and have symptoms relieved and the other one actually wants their life ended. It's much more about the person than the disease, that's an important thing to grasp and often questions and meaning and purpose and hope are right at the heart of it. As Christians we have incredible hope, not just for this life, but in the life beyond, because we're confident in Christ that we are utterly secure and nothing can separate us from his love. That death is not the end but the gateway to judgement and that Jesus has paid the price for our sins and made it possible for us to have a life with God for all eternity and a wonderful new heaven and a new earth that's coming. Many people don't have that hope and I think that that does feed into this culture of despair and the culture of death that we are seeing increasingly recently in a society that is pretty much post-Christian and has lost it's belief.

Emily: What is your prayer for Belgium at this time and also for the UK?

Peter: My prayer for Belgium is that they come to their senses and don't pass this law. That they wake up to the dangers of the path that they're going down. I hope that they will repeal the existing law; that they'll make it illegal once again and instead that they'll put all their investment to good palliative care for end of life patients and good support for those who are disabled. That's my prayer. I pray also for Belgium that as part of a dark continent spiritually that there'll be real revival of belief and faith in Christ. That the Christian faith will advance again throughout the whole continent. My prayers for Britain are pretty similar. I think we have to ask the question, why is there such a big demand from so many people for euthanasia and assisted suicide at a time when medical care and standards of life has never been better? I think that's much more due to the loss of hope and loss of Christian faith; the breakdown of families and so on that accompanies that. Our prayers and heart have got to be for a revival of love, for Christ to transform lives and communities and a real atmosphere of hope in this country.

Emily: How can we find out more about the Christian Medical Fellowship?

Peter: The easiest way is via our website www.cmf.org.uk where you can find lots of information. If you also look at www.carenotkilling.org.uk you'll find lots of information on this specific issue, although on that latter website a lot of it is written from a secular perspective, because we're trying to reach everybody.