500,000 signatures were enough, instead more than a million Italians signed the Legal Euthanasia Referendum. A result above all expectations, announced by Filomena Gallo, secretary of the Luca Coscioni association. “An extraordinary result that comes exactly 15 years after Piergiorgio Welby's letter to President Giorgio Napolitano asking for euthanasia. It was September 23, 2006 and the then President of the Republic replied hoping that the issue would be addressed in the most suitable fora ".

Since then, however, nothing has changed except the fact that public opinion has been increasingly attentive to this issue, thanks also to the power of the new media that have spread every story, and there are hundreds of them every year, similar to Welby's. Stories of pain, of families annihilated by a regulatory vacuum that the promoters of the referendum absolutely want to help fill.

The result obtained with the petition, already upon reaching 500,000 signatures, has aroused mixed reactions.

"It seemed impossible to be able to collect the minimum number of signatures in the summer and moreover in the period of Covid - wrote in a long note Maurizio Mori, professor of moral philosophy and bioethics at the University of Turin and president of the Council of Bioethics onlus - and instead in half the time the goal was reached: a miracle! Perhaps the pandemic has broken down old taboos on dying and overcome the last obstacles ».

A completely different reaction was that of the Italian Bishops' Conference: "Serious concern over the collection of signatures for the referendum that aims to decriminalize the murder of the consenting party, effectively opening up to euthanasia in our country - reads the note from August 18 - Anyone who finds himself in conditions of extreme suffering must be helped to manage pain, to overcome anguish and despair, not to eliminate his own life. Choosing death is the defeat of the human, the victory of an individualistic and nihilistic anthropological conception in which neither hope nor interpersonal relationships find more space. There is no expression of compassion in helping to die, but the Magisterium of the Church recalls that, when the end of earthly existence approaches, the dignity of the human person is specified as the right to die in the greatest possible serenity and with human dignity. and Christian that is due to her ».

Words that Maurizio Mori, more than a real and convinced condemnation, considers “a mild official defense of the traditional thesis. It is surprising - he writes - also that for the CEI the signatures collected would represent the victory of an individualistic and nihilistic anthropological conception: in doing so, the CEI refers to the thesis that it is the selfish individualism of those who are well and only look at themselves to support euthanasia : this individualism would prevent us from seeing the other and his needs, and thus allows those who are fragile and have greater needs for care the possibility of removing the disturbance with euthanasia. On the contrary, solidarity and altruistic anthropology, precisely because it would pay greater attention to the needs of others, would lead to supporting natural death and palliative care as an alternative to euthanasia ». That of the CEI, in reality, is a thesis shared by a large slice of public opinion contrary to what it considers the "false myths of a happy death", as well explained in the text "Do not resist, do not desist" written by Lucio Romano, Massimo Gandolfini and Emanuela Vinai: «There are incurable diseases, but there are no incurable diseases - this is the authors' thesis - helping people who are fighting a bad disease, sharing every moment of their journey can restore lost confidence and courage. To resist when there is nothing more to be done is in vain - they write - to give up when there would still be room for treatment, it is a serious omission. True freedom for all, believers and non-believers, is to choose in favor of life, because only in this way is it possible to build the true good of persons and of society ".

Maurizio Mori, in the recently written note, underlines instead that “at the basis of the request for euthanasia lies human solidarity for those who no longer have a chance and have the right to leave life with dignity and without suffering. Palliative care is an important safeguard but is not always sufficient to avoid the dying situation from hell. More than an alternative to euthanasia, they are complementary: it starts with palliation, and if it works, great! If this is not enough, and the interested party asks for it, euthanasia is passed. It is the interested party who chooses and decides: who else? However, it is not individualistic selfishness that leads to accept and endorse this choice, but human solidarity: what leads us to understand the suffering of the other and to have respect for his choice to close immediately. It is love for the other that makes us take a step back from our immediate (selfish) desire to always have him with us. Individual autonomy and solidarity converge ».

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