Thinking on the current crossroads that many find themselves facing as the inevitable end-of-life decisions await them, Larry Worthen loathes the truth that dying in a country that promotes assisted death has come to render many of the faithful's final days a mere quiet crisis of conscience. 

“ I've discovered that many Christians don't actually see what's wrong with medical assistance in dying (MAiD) when it is actually the antithesis of a Christian death. We felt there was a need to promote the idea to explain the idea of a Christian death to Canadians. As a deacon, there seem to be very few people who are connecting their faith to those end-of-life decisions, almost as if MAiD in Canada is bracketed from any kind of moral consideration,” he said. 

Worthen recalls the  2014 Angus Reid national survey that showed that among Catholics who attended Mass at least once in the previous month, 70 per cent claimed to be in favour of legalizing assisted suicide. 

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As a permanent deacon in the Archdiocese of Halifax-Yarmouth, as well as the executive director of the Christian Medical and Dental Association of Canada (CMDA), Worthen and company have been addressing the troubling disconnect through an initiative that continues to grow, “Dying with Christ, Living with Hope.”

Now beginning its Winter 2026 season, the program sets out to positively explain what a Christian death is at its core, while addressing the growing cultural and moral challenges surrounding death and dying in Canada, largely in the context of MAiD and euthanasia. 

The CMDA course consists of three roughly two-hour sessions complete with informative videos from theologians and health-care professionals, plus reflection and small-group discussions. Designed to allow participants to deliver the course in their home parishes and communities, Dying with Christ uses a “train-the-trainer model” with online, no-cost sessions that equip laypeople to host themselves. 

Brad MacKinnon, a campaign manager at the CMDA, shared how the course facilitators are not experts, but rather aid in inviting guest physicians and nurses, pastors and theologians to tackle both medical and faith-based questions throughout the program. 

MacKinnon said the Dying with Christ program has exploded from a Maritime offering to become an increasingly notable education tool for Christians on the topic of death and dying across a country that needs it most.

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“At the time of this Winter 2026 launch, we have had just over 1,900 people take the course across 50 sessions in every province and territory in Canada. We’ve offered 14 training sessions that have allowed for close to 500 facilitators to be trained,” he said. 

“This is an opportunity for us to talk very specifically about MAiD, which we understand is a very hard topic to think about, in a very straightforward way. It's also been a great ecumenical approach as this is something that crosses every denominational boundary, and it allows us to work together on advocating for conscience rights and for the protection of patients.” 

First developed in 2022 with public sessions beginning in fall 2024, the program has continued to evolve rapidly. The Diocese of Moncton uses it for formation alongside its "Horizons of Hope" program and has begun to explore bilingual elements. 

The program’s videos provide insight from palliative care physicians and nurses such as Margaret Cottle, Twylla Downey, James MacMillan and John Scott, and religious parallels are explained by David Deane, a theologian at the Atlantic School of Theology, and David Guretzki, the president and resident theologian of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada. 

Behind a strong goal of conveying how dying with Christ is attainable for everyone, Worthen explained why Christians must reflect on these themes, more so than ever in a society where death is seen as something that requires minimal preparation. 

“ This is a very high-stakes issue for us as Christians. When faced with suffering in his own life, Jesus accepted that suffering and went through it. We have services such as palliative care, which can provide support and care for people at the end of life, but we need to really reconsider if we think that we're concerned about losing our dignity at the end of life, because that dignity comes from God,” he said. 

As the CMDA continues to help restore the connection between faith and the end of life in parishes across the country, Worthen hopes the thoughts born out of the program are taken seriously, attesting that they remain some of the most important we will have as Christians.

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“A lot of us won’t make an investment in a car without doing the research, or choose a spouse unless we've spent time with them, but this is the most important aspect of someone's life. How do we demonstrate our faith in Christ in our last days and last hours? We need to be prepared for this, we need to think about it, consider it and recognize that our life is a gift from God. It is wrong for us to reject that life when things don't go as we had planned.” 

Learn more at cmdacanada.org/dying-with-christ-living-with-hope/ or contact MacKinnon at [email protected].