Conversations That Matter | Dying Well: Medicine, Ethics, and Dignity at the End of Life
Efforts to expand physician-assisted suicide, often called Medical Aid in Dying, or MAiD, are gaining momentum around the country. Twelve states currently allow assisted-suicide and an additional thirteen are currently considering legislation that would legalize it. The Catholic Church has long stood in opposition to physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia as acts which undermine human dignity and “the moral relationship that unites us with others who share the gift of life and the meaning of existence” (SB, §1).
In this two episode series, we will discuss a range of philosophical, medical, ethical, and theological issues entangled with assisted-suicide and explore the ways Catholics and all people of good will can recover a vision of what it means to live and die well.
Episode 1:
Tuesday, March 17, 2026 | 11:00 a.m. EDT
Watch the Recording of Episode 1
Featured Panelists
Farr Curlin, M.D., is Josiah Trent Professor of Medical Humanities in the Trent Center for Bioethics, Humanities, & History of Medicine and Co-Director of the Theology, Medicine and Culture Initiative (TMC) at Duke University. Dr. Curlin has worked to bring attention to the intersection of medicine, ethics, and theology. In 2012 he helped to found both the University of Chicago’s Program on Medicine and Religion and the annual Conference on Medicine and Religion. Since 2015, through Duke Divinity School’s TMC Initiative, he and colleagues have brought graduate theological training to those with vocations to health care. Starting in 2023, Dr. Curlin also is working with colleagues across North America to develop the Hippocratic Society, an association whose mission is forming clinicians in the practice and pursuit of good medicine. He is co-author, with Chris Tollefsen, of The Way of Medicine: Ethics and the Healing Profession (Notre Dame University Press, 2021), as well as more than 150 articles and book chapters addressing the moral and spiritual dimensions of medical practice.
Melissa Moschella, Ph.D., is Professor of the Practice in Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute for Church Life. Her work spans the fields of ethics, political philosophy, and law, and her areas of special expertise include natural law theory, biomedical ethics, and the family. She is the author of To Whom Do Children Belong? Parental Rights, Civic Education and Children’s Autonomy (Cambridge University Press, 2016), and Ethics, Politics, and Natural Law: Principles for Human Flourishing (University of Notre Dame Press, 2025). Professor Moschella has also published numerous articles in scholarly journals as well as popular media outlets, including Notre Dame Law Review, The American Journal of Jurisprudence, The Journal of Law and Religion, Bioethics, The American Journal of Bioethics, The Journal of Medical Ethics, The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, The New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College, earned a Licentiate in Philosophy summa cum laude from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, and received her Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Princeton University. She lives in South Bend with her husband, David Cloutier, a moral theology professor at Notre Dame.
Daniel P. Sulmasy, M.D., Ph.D., is the André Hellegers Professor of Biomedical Ethics in the Departments of Medicine and Philosophy and serves as Director of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics and as a faculty member of the Pellegrino Center for Clinical Bioethics at Georgetown University. He received his AB and MD degrees from Cornell, trained in internal medicine at Johns Hopkins, and holds a PhD in philosophy from Georgetown. He has served on numerous governmental advisory committees, including the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues, 2010-17. A practicing internist and a philosopher, he is Editor of the journal Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics, and has written extensively on many topics in bioethics, especially regarding care at the end of life. His seven books include Methods in Medical Ethics, The Rebirth of the Clinic, and Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia: Before, During, and After the Holocaust.
Episode 2:
Tuesday, April 14, 2026 | 2:00 pm EDT
Watch the Recording of Episode 2Featured Panelists
Amanda Achtman, M.A., Lic. holds a Master's in John Paul II Philosophical Studies from the Catholic University of Lublin in Poland and a Licentiate in Judaic Studies and Jewish-Christian Relations from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. In addition to roles in journalism, public policy, and advocacy, Amanda worked on Parliament Hill in an effort to prevent the legislative expansion of euthanasia to persons living with disabilities or mental illness. Currently, she is the Ethics Director at Canadian Physicians for Life, teaches a bioethics course for St. Bernard’s School of Theology and Ministry, and is a contributing writer at Public Discourse. Amanda is also the founder of Dying to Meet You, a project of cultural renewal to prevent euthanasia and encourage hope across Canada and around the world.
Charlie Camosy, Ph.D., teaches moral theology and bioethics at The Catholic University of America. Before that, he spent three years teaching bioethics at the Creighton School of Medicine and moral theology at St. Joseph Seminary in New York. He also spent 14 years in Fordham University’s theology department, where he taught since finishing his PhD in moral theology at Notre Dame in 2008. Among other places, his articles have appeared in the American Journal of Bioethics, Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, New York Times, Washington Post, New York Post and America magazine. He has a monthly column with Religion News Service and does regular Q&As for OSV News. He is the author of ten books with one on the way. Peter Singer and Christian Ethics (Cambridge) was named a 2012 “best book” with ABC Religion and Ethics; Beyond the Abortion Wars (Eerdmans), was a 2015 award-winner with the Catholic Media Association; Resisting Throwaway Culture (New City) was named 2020 “Resource of the Year” by the Catholic Publishers Association. His current book project explores the return of infanticide in the post-Christian West. Camosy is also the founding editor of a book series with New City Press called The Magenta Project. In addition to receiving the 2018 St. Jerome Award for scholarly excellence from the Catholic Library Association and the 2024 Smith Award from the University Faculty for Life, Charlie is a proud knight of the St. Peter Claver Society. He and his wife Paulyn have four children, three of whom they adopted from a Filipino orphanage in June of 2016.
Matt Misner, D.O., is a board-certified Pediatrician and long-standing member of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) since 2010. He has worked as a Hospice and Palliative Medicine (PC) physician at the Center for Hospice Care, in Mishawaka, Indiana, since 2020. He has provided face-to-face home and clinical exams to pediatric hospice and palliative care patients, as well as adult patients. He also manages the acute needs of these same patients at the Raclin Center inpatient unit (IPU). He serves as the Education Director at the Center and teaches hospice principles to the Indiana University (IU) students and Family Medicine residents. He also participates in the training of IU Hospice and Palliative Medicine fellows at both participating medical facilities, as well as the University of Notre Dame pre-med students. He also intermittently teaches hospice principles to those students seeking a minor in the field at the University of Indiana in South Bend (IUSB). He acts on behalf of several national committees including in the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO), Pediatric Advisory Council (PAC), and Palliative Care Association of Uganda (PCAU). He completed his Pediatric Hospice and Palliative Care Fellowship program (1/25) through Trinity Hospital/DeVos Children’s Hospital/ Trillium Institute for Hospice Services in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has been accepted and has deferred entrance into the Academy of Pediatric Integrative Medicine (APIM) fellowship until 8/2026. He is currently expanding the Center’s pediatric hospice and palliative care inpatient services at Beacon Memorial Hospital and plans to bring PC services to disabled children receiving care at A Rosie Place in South Bend. He is an active member of the Dignity Action Team of the Right to Life Michiana. He is also an avid overseas medical missionary having lived and served 2 years in both Ebeye, Marshall Islands and in Arequipa, Peru. He is currently serving as the medical advisor for World Villages for Children sponsored by the Sisters of Mary and leads medical groups for mission purposes to Chalco, Mexico each year along with medical trips to Santa Clotilde, Peru in the Amazon region. He performs all assigned duties through the lens of his faith and acts of charity to others. Vivat Jesus (May Jesus Live)!