The Church’s teaching on suicide: everything you need to know

WARNING: The following essay deals with very serious issues. Some readers may be troubled by its content, especially if they have lost loved ones to suicide. Reader discretion is required.

Contents

– Introduction – The Archdiocese of Chicago’s Monument
– The traditional teaching of the Church on suicide
—— Voluntary and involuntary suicide
—— Direct and indirect suicide
– What the Church teaches on the morality of suicide
– The reasons the Church gives for judging suicide to be evil
– ‘Suicidal ideation’: Temptations to suicide
– Talking about temptations to suicide
– The eternal fate of suicides
– Can suicides repent – and can we hope or presume that they did?
—— The anecdote of St John Vianney, Curé d’Ars
—— What is mortal sin, and what is perfect contrition?
—— The practical importance of thinking about eternity
– The Church’s traditional practice regarding suicides
– Are suicides incapable of exercising free will?
– Evaluation of the Chicago monument
– Conclusion – G.K. Chesterton on suicide

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Introduction – The Archdiocese of Chicago’s Monument

(LifeSiteNews) — The Archdiocese of Chicago has erected a cemetery memorial “specifically for survivors of suicide and for the lives lost to suicide.”

The “At Peace” memorial was also intended to honour Father Charles Rubey, who has spent 50 years of his priestly life “fighting the stigma surrounding suicide,” the archdiocese said.

“The memorial,” Rubey claimed, “shows survivors that their loved ones are with God, their lives were sacred and they are included among the faithful.”

The Archdiocese’s article states that “(h)istorically, the Catholic Church denied Catholic funerals in churches and burials in consecrated ground for individuals who died by suicide.”

But now, the article continues, “the Church has undergone a significant transformation in its understanding of suicide and mental illness and now recognizes that many who die by suicide suffer from mental illness and unbearable pain.”

“The Church now embraces these individuals and affirms that they are with God, not condemned,” it claimed.

Rubey also told the Chicago Tribune that he had “developed a ritual to bless sites where people had died from suicide.” “That’s where they encountered God,” he said.

According to the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 48,824 suicide deaths in 2024. While this was somewhat reduced from 2022 and 2023, it is the third highest year on record since 2001; since 2015, there has not been a year in which there have been fewer than 44,000 suicide deaths.^[1]

In 2024, 2.2 million adults attempted suicide, with 4.6 million planning a suicide attempt and 14.3 million seriously thinking about suicide. According to the CDC, the highest suicide rates are among Native Americans and non-Hispanic whites.^[2] Men were nearly four times more likely to kill themselves than women, according to the data.

At the time of publication, France has also become the latest country to legalize “assisted suicide” and euthanasia (distinguished by who administers the lethal drug).

But what is the traditional teaching of the Church on this matter? What is the rationale behind this traditional teaching? And what is the practical effect of denying it under such conditions?

Intention of this article and some disclaimers

The purpose of this article is to present the traditional teaching of the Church on suicide.

However, aside from the intrinsic doctrinal interest of this topic, a second and equally important intention is the protection of the vulnerable.

Suicide is wholly preventable, even if it feels otherwise to the suicidal person. Depression and mental health problems can be managed. The suicidal person must be helped to understand that he is valuable in himself and to society. He is made in the image and likeness of God, and loved by Him, and called by Him to eternal joy, peace, and relief in Heaven – if only he be willing persevere in God’s will for a little while here on Earth. After that, he will realize that “the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come.” (Rom. 8.18)

For decades, the Church’s traditional teaching on a variety of subjects – including suicide – has been obscured. It is not unreasonable to think that some persons who have committed suicide (or had abortions, or embraced other immoral choices) would not have done so if they had been exposed to the traditional teaching of the Church.

It is foreseeable that an exposition of this teaching may cause pain to those who have lost loved ones to suicide. Although it is foreseeable, it is not the intention: the intention is to help rebuild a bulwark and to protect other vulnerable persons from making the same choices as their loved ones.

For these reasons, let us repeat the disclaimer from the start of this essay:

Reader discretion is required.

The traditional teaching of the Church on suicide

In this article, the term suicide refers both to the act of killing oneself and to the person who commits this act.

The Fifth Commandment – or the Sixth, according to Protestant numbering – is Thou shalt not kill. The Church understands this commandment to pertain to a wide variety of matters beyond the direct and intentional murder of a human being. For instance, she considers sins of anger, hatred, and sins of the tongue to be prohibited by this commandment; she also holds that it does not prohibit capital punishment or lethal force used in proportionate self-defense.

The Church has always taught that suicide is a violation of the commandment. The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches:

(The Commandment) also forbids suicide. No man possesses such power over his own life as to be at liberty to put himself to death. Hence we find that the Commandment does not say: Thou shalt not kill another, but simply: Thou shalt not kill.

St. Augustine, cited by St. Thomas Aquinas, also teaches:

(T)he words “Thou shalt not kill” refer to the killing of a man, not another man; therefore, not even thyself. For he who kills himself, kills nothing else than a man.^[3]

While the suicidal act is a sin against the Fifth Commandment, temptation to sin is no sin at all (unless the person consents to it); neither is depression. Both will be addressed below.

Two Dominican moral theologians, Frs McHugh and Callan, distinguish various forms of self-killing. We will follow their two-volume 1958 work, Moral Theology: A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas and the Best Modern Authorities, throughout this work: it is a standard reference work, and represents the standard theses held prior to Vatican II.

Let us consider the delineation they provide, which is standard among other theologians.

1. Voluntary and involuntary suicide

The distinction between voluntary and involuntary suicide is explained as follows:

(I)t is voluntary or involuntary, according as it proceeds from knowledge and choice, or as it is committed without realization of what is done or without the intention to produce death.^[4]

Examples of the latter include someone who is insane and unable to act freely, or acts accidentally (e.g., pretends to hang himself and dies as an accident). We will address the question of insanity below.

2. Direct and indirect suicide

The theologians continue, explaining the difference between direct and indirect suicide:

Suicide is direct when the act “tends from its nature to the death of the person who does it” – such as shooting oneself in the head, taking poison, or jumping from a building.^[5] It can be committed by a positive action or by an omission (such as the refusal to eat).

It is indirect if the nature of the action or omission points to another outcome: e.g., one goes to a leper colony for the sake of caring for the lepers rather than to die of leprosy; or one carries out dangerous work on a roof as part of one’s state of life, rather than to plummet to one’s death.

“Indirect suicide” – even if voluntary – is not a sin, “if there is a proportionately grave reason” for the action or omission, in spite of the death that would follow. This is an example of the principle of double effect, and reasons that might be considered sufficient include the public good, the good of another in extreme spiritual need, one’s own higher good (i.e., the exercise of virtue, such as yielding one’s place in a lifeboat) or certain temporal goods (such as dangerous but necessary work).^[6]

Without sufficiently grave reasons, “indirect suicide” has the same culpability as direct suicide.

What the Church teaches on the morality of suicide

From all this, the theologians conclude:

Voluntary and direct suicide is always a most grave sin (…)

As we have seen, even “indirect suicide” can be essentially the same thing as voluntary and direct suicide, under certain circumstances.

However, the Dominicans add to the above conclusion: “if committed without due authority (i.e. the command of God.”^[7]

Regarding this latter point, the Catholic Encyclopedia explains further:

God being the master of our life He may with His own consent remove from suicide whatever constitutes its disorder. Thus do some authorities justify the conduct of certain saints, who, impelled by the desire of martyrdom and especially to protect their chastity did not wait for their executioners to put them to death, but sought it in one manner or other themselves; nevertheless, the Divine will should be certain and clearly manifested in each particular case.^[8]

St. Augustine seems to have believed this to be the case for Samson and certain female saints seeking to preserve their chastity, and St. Thomas Aquinas seems to have followed him for a few such exceptional cases.^[9]

As we already saw above, McHugh and Callan recognize the possibility that God may consent to the killing of oneself – but they question whether it has ever actually happened, or whether cases like those mentioned (e.g., those seeking to preserve chastity) should be explained with reference to invincible ignorance.

Certainly, such an exceptional case cannot be presumed – especially if it is presumed on the basis of suffering and terminal illness. “The consent of God” would, we may assume, be made known in an infallibly certain way, and not based on our own feelings or judgments.

Further, the presumption that God permits suicide to end one’s suffering, or to “die with dignity,” is contrary to the heart of the Gospel, which is the Cross and suffering endured for love of God.

But why does the Church consider suicide a grave, or “mortal” sin?

The reasons the Church gives for judging suicide to be evil

The primary reason for the sinfulness of direct and voluntary suicide is that it is an offense against God and His rights. McHugh and Callan explain succinctly:

It is a grave injury against the rights of God, for it usurps His authority, refuses Him the service He desires, spurns the gift He has bestowed, dishonors the image of God (Gen., ix. 6), and destroys the property of God: “Thou, O Lord, hast the power of life and death” (Wis., xvi. 13).^[10]

However, God’s sovereignty is not the only reason suicide is gravely sinful. St. Thomas Aquinas treats of suicide under the topic of murder, explaining that as well as being an offense against God, it is also an offense against the community, and nature.^[11]

It is a sin against society, McHugh and Callan explain, for the following reasons:

• The community has a right to benefit from the lives of its members,
• It is a cause of great sorrow and disgrace for the family of the suicide,
• It is a scandal which has a “demoralizing effect” on others (e.g., normalizes suicide, making it “easier” to do the same).

The two Dominicans pre-empt objections to some of these points:

The fact that the death of this or that man is not felt as a loss by a family or the State, but rather as a relief, is no argument; for if suicide were left to human decision, how many fatal mistakes would be made!^[12] Persons valuable to society would rashly kill themselves, fearing in a mood of depression that they were worthless; others who could contribute nothing in material ways would destroy themselves and deprive their fellow-men of an example of fortitude, or at least of the opportunity of showing charity and mercy to the needy.

They continue, explaining why suicide is also a sin against nature – and one more grave than murder itself:

Direct and voluntary suicide is a sin against the deepest natural inclination, for self-preservation is called the first law of nature^[13], and also against that love of self which charity requires.^[14]

Since charity to self is more obligatory than charity to the neighbor, suicide is a more serious sin than other forms of homicide. Nor is it excused by the desire of some good for self. The suicide does not better himself by his act, for, since he has not fulfilled his trust in this life, what can he expect in the next life? He escapes the lesser evils of physical miseries or moral temptations, but he incurs the greater evils of physical death and of moral cowardice and defeat, to say nothing of his punishment in the hereafter.^[15]

Those who co-operate in the suicide of another, McHugh and Callan add – i.e., “those who incite, advise, command, or assist another to commit suicide” – are themselves “guilty of moral murder.” The application of this judgment to modern assisted suicide programs – such as France’s new regime, and Canada’s “Medical Assistance in Dying” (MAiD) – is obvious. The suicides of those who are terminally ill or in great suffering are as much a violation of God’s rights and of nature as any other suicide; but while they have been justified on the grounds of relieving the burden on society, they actually deprive the community of the opportunity of caring for the suffering and terminally ill, and the many benefits attendant on such care.

Aside from the very real danger of coercion – especially when society treats such persons as a burden, rather than a benefit – these MAiD programs also deprive the suffering person of opportunities to die well and save his soul, to expiate the sins of his life, to unite himself to the person of Christ crucified, to bring glory to God, and to merit greater glory and happiness for himself in Paradise.

This is the teaching of the Church. It is neither possible to deny it, nor to reduce it to a meaningless formula (by an attempt to maintain the terms and words of the teaching, while changing its meaning or interpretation).

‘Suicidal ideation’: Temptations to suicide

As already mentioned, neither depression nor a temptation to suicide (“suicidal ideation”) are sinful. While the spiritual should not be neglected, it is usually a mistake to “spiritualize” depression (e.g., by treating it as a spiritual or moral problem, overly focusing on spiritual remedies to what is normally a medical or emotional problem, etc.). We have written about the different ways in which depression can be mischaracterized by well-intentioned Catholics elsewhere.

However, such temptations certainly are a spiritual problem, even if they are often also occasioned by depression or mental health issues, which should be treated by professionals in those areas.

It is ironic that while some well-intentioned persons wish to “spiritualize” depression, others seek to “naturalize” temptations to suicide.

A temptation to suicide is not sinful, unless a person consents to it, or voluntarily “wallows” in it in some other way.^[16]

Such temptations are also distinct from wishing that one were dead, or reflecting on the relief from present physical or mental suffering that death might bring – although dwelling on such thoughts is not advisable, and it is easy see how they could become sinful.

Someone can feel trapped in a maelstrom of depression and temptations to suicide, unable to see any light at the end of the tunnel – but unless he commits the suicidal act, or consents to the temptations to do so, he is simply in the eye of the storm and is committing no sin. If he is not consenting to or flirting with the thoughts, he is in fact resisting them; all he has to do is to seek the help of God, and remain in that state, with God, while the tempest whirls around him. Eventually it will pass, or lessen. If such temptations are fought manfully, they can even be an occasion for grace and virtue.

And even if such a person does fall into a merely internal sin in this matter, he should not lose hope, but have immediate recourse to God, seeking pardon from God’s infinite love and mercy.

Talking about temptations to suicide

The Archdiocese of Chicago article mentions the idea of fighting or removing the “stigma” around suicide, as does the U.K. government’s five-year suicide prevention strategy. While this phrasing suggests a desire to normalize suicide, it seems rather to refer to normalizing talking about suicidal ideation, at least with trusted persons or professionals.

As well as providing the occasion for medical treatment for possible causes of the suicidal temptations, such “talking” provides an instructive parallel with traditional spiritual advice regarding dealing with temptations. St. Francis de Sales writes:

One great remedy against all manner of temptation, great or small, is to open the heart and lay bare its suggestions, likings, and dislikings, to your director; for, as you may observe, the first condition which the Evil One makes with a soul, when he wants to seduce it, is silence. Even as a bad man, seeking to seduce a woman, enjoins silence concerning himself to her father or husband, whereas God would always have us make known all His inspirations to our superiors and guides.

However, while modern suicide prevention programs may help suicidal persons relieve the pressure of their temptations, they may treat the matter as a bad choice, rather than as a sin. They might consider suicidal ideation as a “temptation,” but this will be a temptation to the bad choice of suicide, rather than to sin.

This is not to denigrate the idea of speaking to others about temptations to suicide, which many have found helpful – and some are alive today because of them. But such methods are deprived of a simple and necessary tool in the arsenal of suicide prevention: the clear statement that suicide will not make anything better for the suicidal person; it will make it infinitely worse.^[17]

For this reason, such programs may emphasize the negative consequences of suicide on those left behind, but they will not consider the consequences of such a choice on the suicidal person’s own soul in eternity.

Even if this teaching of the Church is controversial and upsetting to the bereaved, some suicidal persons have reported that an awareness of eternity and eternal punishment has been the ultimate bulwark against killing themselves, and instrumental in overcoming their situation.

Let us consider this fundamental matter further.

The eternal fate of suicides

In his epic poem The Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri presents the souls of the suicides as condemned to Hell. Their souls, one of the damned explains, fall to the particular circle of Hell; like a seed, it sprouts into a tree, which is then savaged by Harpies.

The damned soul explains that, when the dead are reunited with their bodies on the last day, and go to either Heaven or Hell, the suicides alone will not be permitted to “wear” their bodies:

Like the rest, we shall return to claim our bodies,
but never again to wear them—wrong it is
for a man to have again what he once cast off.

We shall drag them here and, all along that mournful
forest, our bodies shall hang forever more,
each one a thorn of its own alien shade.

Although Dante’s poem is a work of literature, rather than theology, it bears witness to the sorts of ideas that were present in the ages of faith; in this case, the unique situation of the suicides conveys the horror that Catholics felt toward the act of self-murder.

It also conveys the belief that those who voluntarily commit suicide are damned. The reason for this is simple: as described above, suicide is a “grave” or “mortal sin.”

Mortal sin is an offense by which a person so prefers some created good that he turns himself wholly away from God, and so merits damnation. It is the supreme rejection of God as the sovereign good and lawgiver of creation: St. Bernard teaches that it is equivalent to a creature rising up against God and seeking to kill Him, or wishing Him to cease to exist or be God.^[18] One who commits a mortal sin loses the grace of God, and continues in a state of enmity with God – unless he is restored to his friendship before death.

If the final act of a person is the act of suicide, and if he is culpable for this act, then he dies in this state of mortal sin and enmity with God, he is necessarily damned to Hell.

But what if the suicidal act was not the person’s final act?

Can suicides repent – and can we hope or presume that they did?

Later in this article, we will consider whether one can consider anyone who commits suicide to be “not of right mind,” and thus not culpable of mortal sin. But for now, let us consider the following questions:

• What if the suicidal act is not the final act of the person?
• What if he repents between the act and his own death?
• Should we hope that this is the case?
• What are the effects of such ideas on suicide rates?

First, we can be clear: if the act which brings about the person’s death is not their final act, and some time intervenes, then the person may indeed be able to seek God’s mercy and find it.

This would seem to be excluded by someone who commits suicide in a way that brings about instant death. St. Thomas Aquinas writes:

Moreover [suicide] is most dangerous since no time is left wherein to expiate it by repentance.^[19]

It will be objected that God, who is outside time, can operate in ways which we might not understand. An anecdote from the life of St. John Vianney is usually cited in support of such hope. Bishop Robert Barron recently used it to suggest that even Judas might have been saved.

1. The anecdote of St John Vianney, Curé d’Ars

A certain Fr. Guillaumet met a woman who went to visit St. John Vianney soon after her husband had committed suicide. The saint’s biographer, Abbé François Trochu, recounts the meeting as follows:

Suddenly the Curé d’Ars appeared, still wearing his surplice. He stopped in front of the lady in black, who, following the example of the crowd, had gone down on her knees. He bent over her and whispered into her ear: “He is saved!” The woman started. M. Vianney repeated: “He is saved!” A gesture of incredulity was the only reply of the stranger.

Whereupon the saint, stressing each word, repeated: “I tell you he is saved. He is in Purgatory, and you must pray for him. Between the parapet of the bridge and the water he had time to make an act of contrition. Our Blessed Lady obtained that grace for him. Remember the shrine that you put up in your room during the month of May. Though your husband professed to have no religion, he sometimes joined in your prayers; this merited for him the grace of repentance and pardon at the last moment.”^[20]

While this anecdote is touching, and conveys the power of Our Lady’s glorious intercession and faithfulness to her clients, it in fact does no more than convey the possibility of such last-minute repentance, and one example of this possibility being realised. It does not provide grounds for a sentimental hope that this occurs for all (or even any) other suicides.

2. What is mortal sin, and what is perfect contrition?

Repentance itself is a grace of God, and none of us should presume that we will receive this grace. We have no right to it, and God has not promised that He will give it in the moments between the suicidal act and death. We therefore have no reason for expecting this to be the case. To act otherwise can manifest the sin of presumption.

Further, in order for a person to be forgiven of mortal sins outside of baptism or the sacrament of penance, a mere regret of his actions is insufficient. It is necessary that he have perfect contrition.

To understand why, let us recall the nature of mortal sin as a voluntary rebellion against God. It is opposed to the theological virtue of supernatural charity – the supernatural love of God above all things. Both mortal sin and charity destroy the other in a soul, and this is why perfect contrition remits mortal sin by its own nature. Such contrition is a sorrow for all one’s sins, based primarily on charity; it naturally therefore also presumes the theological virtue of faith, and at least an implicit desire for the sacrament of penance. This sorrow also entails a hatred of sin, and an intention never to commit mortal sin again.^[21]

The idea that someone who chooses to commit a mortal sin might follow it with an act of perfect contrition is not impossible; what is impossible is to presume he will do so. As St. Alphonsus says:

“I will hereafter give myself to God.” Behold the false hope of sinners, which leads them to remain in sin till death, and from death conducts them to hell! Who are you that say, you will hereafter give yourself to God? But who, I ask, promises you that you shall have time to give yourself to God, and that you shall not meet with a sudden death, which will take you out of this world before you give yourself to him? “He,” says St. Gregory, “who has promised pardon to penitents has not promised tomorrow to sinners.” (Hom. xii. in Ev.) The Lord has promised pardon to all who repent of their sins; but to those who wish to continue in sin he has not promised time for repentance.^[22]

Sin also makes it harder to make such acts of virtue, and easier to commit further sins and to remain in a state of sin. As the saying goes, “a tree falls the way it leans.” One who willingly chooses to commit mortal sin can by no means be sure that he will receive even the grace of imperfect contrition, let alone perfect contrition.

All this explains why one cannot presume on God’s grace, whether for oneself with regard to suicide or any other mortal sin, or for one who has already committed suicide.

3. The practical importance of thinking about eternity

In fact, it is more proper and conducive to the common good for the contrary to be presumed about those who have committed suicide. Although such ideas will no doubt cause great pain to the bereaved, they represent a significant deterrent and thus a great good to society and to individuals. Father Aloysius Ambruzzi, S.J., explained the importance of a lively sense of the possibility of eternal damnation as a powerful means of avoiding it:

We are created to know, to serve, and to love God in this life, and to enjoy Him for ever hereafter. The love of God, our Creator, and our Father, should be the ordinary motive of our actions. However, there are moments in our life when temptations of the most alluring kind assail us, when all ideas of right and wrong, so clear at other times, become vague and uncertain, when even God seems to depart from us, leaving us for a moment exposed to the attack of our bitter enemies. It is the thought of Hell that will prove most helpful at such times.

That is why the Saints were familiar with it; even those who most excelled in the love of God. By thinking of the fire of Hell, many martyrs rejected the blandishments of tyrants, and suffered torments, prison, and death for Christ. By thinking often of Hell many Christians refrain from sin in the midst of dangers and temptations. “It is Hell that peoples Heaven,” said Pascal.^[23]

By contrast, we could say that Hell is peopled by denying or ignoring it, and attacking the presumption that those who commit suicide go there.

This is not an injunction for suicidal persons to spend all their time thinking about Hell – least of all if it aggravates their state. There are also classes of person (e.g., the scrupulous) who are generally advised not to spend too much time thinking about such matters; some would profit more from reflecting on the great love of God for them. What is under discussion is maintaining an awareness of Hell, the reality that voluntary suicide is a mortal sin which merits a place there, and the other reality that God gives sufficient grace to prevent all men from going there.

As already stated, there are suicidal persons who have stated that an awareness of eternity, damnation, and Hell have, at times, been the only things holding them back from killing themselves. A denial of the sinfulness of suicide, a minimization of the dangers of falling into Hell, and an over-emphasis on the possibility of last-minute contrition, all create social conditions in which it is easier for vulnerable persons to follow the deceased’s actions and commit suicide themselves.

Finally, it is absurd to take an account of a private revelation from St. John Vianney about an exceptional case, and to present it as a general rule; it is also utterly callous and reckless to do this at the expense of vulnerable suicidal persons simply to comfort the bereaved. The emotional needs of the bereaved cannot be allowed to jeopardize the wellbeing – both eternal and temporal – of such vulnerable persons, by making it easier for someone to choose suicide.

The Church’s traditional practice regarding suicides

What we have seen above is the rationale behind the Church’s traditional treatment of suicide, and those who attempt to commit suicide, whether successfully or otherwise. Let us now consider how the Church’s practice – now considered controversial – has also served as an effective form of suicide prevention over the past centuries.

McHugh and Callan begin by discussing the canonical penalties for attempted suicide. First, those who attempt suicide incur “irregularity”:

1861. Canonical Penalties for Suicide.—(a) Those who attempt suicide are irregular ex delicto (Canon 985, n. 5).

“Irregularity” is a “perpetual impediment” preventing someone from receiving holy orders, or from exercising them (e.g., saying Mass, etc.).^[24]. “Irregularities ex delicto” simply refers to such an impediment being caused by a gravely sinful act, rather than some other defect for which one is not culpable.

The Dominicans continue:

(b) If they die, they are not given ecclesiastical burial unless they gave signs of repentance before death (Canon 1240, n, 3), and, if they recover, they are subject to various penalties^[25] (Canon 2350, Sec. 2).

Being deprived of ecclesiastical burial means that the remains of the deceased cannot be brought to the Church; it cannot receive funeral rites, or be buried in consecrated ground. This prohibition is very ancient, being mentioned at the Council of Braga in 563.^[26] While this prohibition usually allows burial in a separate part of a churchyard, former periods of history often disposed of the remains in ways that conveyed the gravity and shamefulness of what was considered self-murder.^[27] The 1983 Code of Canon Law removed the specificity of this restriction; some conservatives may argue that it remains in the less specific terms of Can. 1184 §3^[28] – although the clarity of such an interpretation is rendered debatable by actions such as those of the Archdiocese of Chicago – especially if it is left unchecked by the Vatican.

The practices of history would be considered harsh by many today, but we cannot help but note that both their very harshness and the horror which they inspired were a powerful disincentive for those considering suicide. Even if individuals personally did not believe in eternal punishment, an awareness of the social situation of their families will have stayed many hands over the centuries.

Even with these measures, though, the Church’s law gave the a level of benefit of the doubt to the deceased:

(c) If it is doubtful whether a person committed suicide, or was responsible, the doubt is decided in his favor, provided no scandal is likely.^[29]

Nor is this merely a modern phenomenon.^[30] However, it is possible for this “benefit of the doubt” to be extended further than is justified – not only in practical decisions on how to deal with a deceased person here and now, but also in principle. It is primarily extended by the presumption that anyone who kills themselves can be presumed to be morally innocent, due to a derangement of the mind.

This has the potential to lead to disastrous consequences for both society and individuals.

Are suicides incapable of exercising free will?

The Chicago Tribune reports the word of a female Rabbi in attendance at the suicide memorial “dedication” event as follows:

The mother said she has come to understand that suicide isn’t the result of an informed choice or rational decision.

“A healthy brain does not plan its own demise,” she added.

Such an idea appears to allow someone to profess the Church’s teaching in principle, while emptying it to a meaningless formula.

McHugh and Callan were aware of this idea; they and other pre-conciliar writers recognized the plausibility of reduced culpability in “a large percentage” of cases.^[31]

However, a presumption of reduced culpability should not be extended too far. Anecdotally, Dr. Alok Kanojia, an American psychiatrist and YouTube personality, told The Diary of a CEO’s Steven Bartlett the following:

… Fifty per cent of men who kill themselves have no history or evidence of mental illness. And I believe this statistic in my clinical practice, because I know what depression looks like, I know what bipolar disorder looks like, and half the men that I’ve worked with, at least, are not actually mentally ill.

See, mental illness means a pathology of the mind, which means that the mind is malfunctioning. Most of the suicidal men that I work with – their mind isn’t malfunctioning. They genuinely have a life that is no longer worth living. They’re looking at things objectively, realizing that there’s no way out of the situation, so they turn to suicide.

I know it’s kind of a very controversial statement, but I think that’s what my clinical practice has shown, and there’s some research to even back that up.^[32]

Dr. Kanojia is appears to be speaking loosely: nobody “genuinely” has a life that is no longer worth living. Every life is worth living. But the point he makes is instructive: these suicidal persons are making a choice based on a mistaken appraisal of the situation, rather than having lost the use of their intellect or will. Part of the answer for such men is to show them the meaning that they feel they lack – and the first and most foundational part of this is the knowledge from the Catechism, that God made each one of us “to know him, love him and serve him in this world and to be happy with him forever in the next.”

The general point which he raises are, however, borne out by governmental statistics. The UK Government’s five year strategy for suicide prevention lists the following as the main “risk factors” for suicide:

• Physical illness
• Financial difficulty and economic adversity
• Harmful gambling
• Substance misuse
• Domestic abuse
• Social isolation and loneliness^[33]

The CDC also lists a variety of similar factors. As such, to extend a presumption of reduced culpability in many suicide cases,  due to mental illness, to a certainty in all cases is not legitimate. McHugh and Callan write the following:

It would be a mistake to say that no person who commits suicide is free, but no doubt a large percentage of those who kill themselves are not responsible for their act.^[34]

This “mistake”, which they mention, would effectively constitute another reduction of the Church’s traditional teaching to a meaningless formula, based on unproven and wholly gratuitous assumption that all who kill themselves are insane or acting without free will. While this may be the case in many situations, emphasizing it necessarily makes it easier it easier for someone to kill themselves, as it deprives society and its individual members of a salutary bulwark against suicide.

Evaluation of the Chicago monument

Now that we have considered the matter of suicide in a comprehensive manner, emphasizing the harm done by obscuring the Church’s teaching and making it easier for persons to choose to kill themselves, let us consider the monument erected in the Archdiocese of Chicago.

The 1917 Code of Canon Law stated:

Can. 1211. Local Ordinaries, pastors, and Superiors who look to such things shall take care lest in cemeteries epitaphs, funereal praises, and ornate monuments, [and] anything [else] inconsistent with Catholic religion and piety occur.

The comparable canon in the 1983 Code is less specific:

Can. 1243 Particular law is to establish appropriate norms about the discipline to be observed in cemeteries, especially with regard to protecting and fostering their sacred character.

The canonists Bouscaren et al. explain, with reference to the 1917 Code, that the canon excludes monuments indicating “inconsolable grief” or “perpetual separation,” as well as that which essentially canonizes the deceased.^[35].

For the reasons discussed in this article, such a prohibition certainly would have applied to monuments like the one in Chicago, which is indeed “inconsistent with Catholic religion and piety.”

To evaluate application to the Chicago monument, let us review the reasons stated in the archdiocesan article for erecting it. They included the following:

• “[F]or surviving families and loves ones affected by suicide.”
• “[A] reminder that no one grieves alone and that every person is held in God’s loving care.” (Bishop Lawrence J. Sullivan, Vicar General)
• “[T]o be a place of peace, healing and comfort” for “families carrying the pain of losing a loved one to suicide.” (Bishop Lawrence J. Sullivan, Vicar General)
• “[A] visible sign of the Church’s commitment to accompanying those who grieve the loss of a loved one to suicide and to affirm God’s enduring mercy and love for those who died by suicide.”
• To represent the “significant transformation” in the Church’s “understanding of suicide and mental illness.”
• To convey that “[t]he Church now embraces these individuals [‘who die by suicide’]” and to affirm “that they are with God, not condemned.”
• Honouring Fr. Rubey for “fighting the stigma surrounding suicide” (with such a statement appearing to mean more than just stigma around talking about suicidal temptations.)
• To show “the Church’s willingness to acknowledge past misunderstandings of suicide.” (Fr. Rubey, in the archdiocesan article)
• “[T]o help reduce the stigma often associated with mental illness and suicide.”
• “[A]dressing [suicide] with compassion, understanding and faith.” (Bishop Sullivan)
• “[T]o offer a sense of comfort and support to anyone who sits within the angel’s embrace.”
• To “symboliz[e] hope and transcendence.”

Based on what we have seen in this article, it is clear that the intentions and meaning behind this monument are indeed “inconsistent with Catholic religion and piety.” They are largely premised on a rejection of what the Catholic religion and piety presented to the world, as detailed in this article.

But this is not the only problem with the monument.

While the primary intentions may be to comfort the bereaved, and to remove the “stigma” around talking about suicide, the actual effect is to convey a set of ideas which contradict Catholic teaching, and to normalize suicide. This is ultimately a form of callousness toward those suffering with suicidal temptations, making it easier for them to end their lives.

In the terms of moral theology, it is a scandal. To return to our Dominican moral theologians:

In the strict sense, scandal is defined as “any conduct that has at least the appearance of evil and that offers to a neighbor an occasion of spiritual ruin.”

… Scandal is an occasion of a fall into sin, that is, it sets an example of sin before the attention, and thus suggests to the will that the will imitate the sin.^[36]

There can be no doubt that the more “inhumane” practices of the Middle Ages, or even the comparatively light restrictions of the period immediately before Vatican II, would have caused great suffering for the bereaved. But this suffering would itself have been a powerful normative deterrent to other living persons tempted to kill themselves. By contrast, consider what is advised by the educational provider Signs of Suicide (SOS):

Use the phrase “died by suicide.” This term may seem awkward to use when you’re used to hearing other phrases. But it avoids using words like “committed,” which some people feel blames the victim […]

Discuss suicide as a public health concern, not a crime.

Such advice seems to be a simple refusal to use a powerful means of suicide prevention. Given the high levels of suicide in the modern era, one may wonder whether the combination of the Church’s teaching and the more modest restrictions enshrined in the 1917 Code of Canon Law might not be a more effective form of suicide prevention, even today.^[37] This is also to say nothing of the supernatural graces available in the Catholic Church to help a person overcome suicidal ideation, insofar as it is a spiritual temptation (without excluding medical or psychological interventions which may be necessary insofar as these temptations may be arising from depression or mental health issues). Who will seek such graces if they are not aware that they need them, or that they are available?

Conclusion

As stated at the beginning: Suicide is wholly preventable, even if it feels otherwise to the suicidal person. Depression and mental health problems can be managed. The suicidal person is valuable in himself and to society. He is made in the image and likeness of God, and loved by him, and called by him to eternal joy, peace and relief in Heaven – if only he be willing to persevere in God’s will a little while here on Earth.

Temptation or desires to commit suicide are not sins in themselves, and those who experience them should struggle against them bravely, making use of the help of both the supernatural and natural means of suicide prevention. There are some resources for this at the end of this article.

But we cannot and must not assent to the modern dogma that suicide is morally indifferent, or that nobody who commits suicide has moral agency in doing so, or promote ideas that make it easier for a person to turn to suicide as the “answer” to their problems. If anything facilitates suicide, it is the departure from the Church’s teaching that these approaches represent.

To conclude, let us consider the words of G.K. Chesterton in Orthodoxy, on the role the traditional teaching played in his growing appreciation of Christianity. In his explanation of how the traditional understanding of suicide brought him to Christianity, he is considerably harsher than we have been in this essay.

While this much loved figure does not perhaps give an adequate account of impaired culpability in some cases, his words recall the “50%” of men without meaning, mentioned by Dr. Kanojia (who, we must add, should be presented with the meaning they are searching for – Our Lord Jesus Christ – rather than simply castigated), and offer a corrective to the scandal of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s monument:

[A]n argument arose whether it was not a very nice thing to murder one’s self. Grave moderns told us that we must not even say “poor fellow,” of a man who had blown his brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and humane.

Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: for each has received a personal affront.

Of course there may be pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven through the body, than in Mr. Archer’s suicidal automatic machines. There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man’s crime is different from other crimes – for it makes even crimes impossible.

About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the universe.^[38]

Suicide is preventable.

The CDC has some resources here: https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/resources/index.html

You can also read about warning signs and how to talk to someone in your life who may be at risk.

You can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline (The Lifeline is toll-free, available 24/7, 365 days a year). You can also chat at Chat at 988lifeline.org

You should also consider reaching out to a traditional Catholic priest in your area.