Secular legal frameworks are often “one size fits all,” but Catholic life is anything but. From navigating Rhode Island’s healthcare-proxy laws to maximizing the impact of a charitable gift through an IRA, there is much to consider when planning for the future. Rhode Island Catholic Associate Editor Laura Kilgus spoke with local estate attorney Geoffrey M. Aptt to discuss how seniors can protect their spiritual and financial legacy, ensuring that their final wishes are carried out in full communion with the Church.
This is one of the most common conversations I have with practicing Catholic clients, and the standard Rhode Island statutory form does not address it. Rhode Island’s healthcare-proxy framework is secular by design. If you sign it without modification, you may unintentionally authorize choices that conflict with Church teaching.
Catholic moral theology—anchored in Pope John Paul II’s 2004 allocution and the U.S. bishops’ “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services” Directive 58 treats nutrition and hydration as, in principle, “an ordinary and morally obligatory means of preserving life, even when that care is provided artificially.”
It is not the same as a ventilator or aggressive chemotherapy, which the Church classifies as potentially extraordinary means that a patient may decline. The presumption is that food and water continue, even by tube, unless they can no longer reasonably attain their purpose or impose significant physical discomfort on the patient.
A Catholic-aligned directive should do three things the standard form does not:
• Affirm the presumption in favor of nutrition and hydration, even when provided artificially, until it has worn out its proper finality or has become a burden.
• Reject euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide in plain language, while permitting comfort medication (palliative sedation) even if it may, as a foreseen but unintended side effect, shorten life. The principle of double effect matters here.
• Request the Sacraments—Reconciliation, Anointing of the Sick, and Holy Communion as Viaticum—and instruct your agent to arrange for a priest when you are seriously ill or in danger of death, but before the immediate danger of death, if possible.
The Diocese of Providence has a great form for this (find it here: https://www.dioceseofprovidence.org/end-of-life), which was spearheaded by Father Christopher M. Mahar, Ph.D., S.T.D., pastor of St. Augustine Parish, Providence, and who was appointed to the Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development at the Vatican in April 2018.
The best vehicle for most seniors is to name the charity as a beneficiary of a traditional IRA or other pre-tax retirement account. Here’s why: every dollar in a traditional IRA is “income in respect of a decedent” — when a human heir inherits it, they pay ordinary income tax on the distributions, and under the SECURE Act most non-spouse beneficiaries must drain the account within ten years (Treasury’s final regulations under TD 9930 took effect January 1, 2025). A qualified charity, by contrast, pays no income tax. So a $50,000 IRA bequest to a parish delivers the full $50,000 to the parish, while the same bequest to a child might net them only $30,000–$35,000 after federal and Rhode Island income tax.
For larger gifts—say, a significantly appreciated stock position or a vacation property—a charitable remainder trust can be a powerful tool. You transfer the appreciated asset into the trust, the trust sells it without paying capital-gains tax, you (or you and your spouse) receive income for life, and whatever remains at the end goes to your parish or chosen charity. You get an immediate income-tax deduction for the present value of the remainder, you spread the capital gain over your lifetime, and the charity gets a meaningful gift.
For lifetime gifts, anyone over 70½ should know about the qualified charitable distribution, which lets you direct up to $111,000 per year (the 2026 inflation-adjusted limit) from your IRA directly to a qualifying charity without the distribution counting as taxable income. For seniors taking required minimum distributions, this is often the single best charitable-giving tool available.
To learn more or for assistance with setting up your final charitable gift, contact Timothy McCaig, Executive Director of the Catholic Foundation of Rhode Island.
Smaller, mission-specific gifts—Mass intentions, building-fund pledges, scholarship endowments—can be specified in the trust or will itself with a simple bequest clause. We make sure the parish’s exact legal name is used, because “St. Mary’s Church” is not always the legally recognized name of the diocesan corporation that actually holds the parish assets.
1. Honesty. Not just legally honest—temperamentally honest. Someone who will not be tempted to mix your money with their own or to “borrow” from the estate.
2. Organization. Probate and trust administration is paperwork. A lot of paperwork. The right person opens the mail, files the tax returns, keeps receipts, and answers the bank’s questions.
3. Availability. A son who lives in Singapore is a worse executor than a niece who lives in Warwick, all else equal. Geography matters more than people think.
4. Calm under pressure. Especially if family conflict is foreseeable. Grief and money are a volatile combination.
5. Willingness to ask for help. The best lay executors and trustees are the ones who know what they don’t know and call the attorney, the CPA, and the financial advisor when they need to.
Geoffrey M. Aptt, Esq., is the founder and principal attorney at Aptt Law LLC, an estate, trust, and business planning firm in East Greenwich, Rhode Island, serving families and closely-held businesses throughout Rhode Island and Massachusetts. The firm can be reached at (401) 264-0654 or at www.apttlaw.com.
This article is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Readers should consult a licensed attorney about their specific circumstances.
