Contemporary Crematorium

Metropolitan Meletios (Kalamaras) of Nikopolis

an excerpt from the introduction of Metropolitan Meletios (Kalamaras) of Nikopolis to the Holy Synod of Greece prior to the Legalization of Abortion in Greece (1986)

The problem of abortion does not concern only the women who run to carry out the abortion before they are even fully aware of the pregnancy, but also the doctors who perform the abortion. It also concerns those who are obligated to cooperate or agree, even if with only one nod. Because life is a very holy occasion, the theme of abortion cannot be limited to those who carry them out. It is a matter of universal moral conscience, and the conscience does not tolerate irresponsible actions.

Those who favor the legislation of abortion claim that such a law solves major problems. However, we must not forget that with similar rationale Hitler faced the 'problem' of the Jews. Emphatically, the Cardinal Wyszyński emphasized in his homily to the students of Warsaw the words: "We are grave-diggers who permitted in our country to again let the terrible crematorium be lit. In our times in one hospital of Poland there is a crematorium oven to burn the bodies of children who didn't reach birth. We have no right to condemn the people who came and occupied our land, and who lit in the past the ovens of the crematoria in Poland at Auschwitz, if today we are doing the same. Let us stop speaking about the thousands murdered by the Nazis, when the number murdered in these last years is much greater than the number of victims in the concentration camps." For that matter, Roussler, the German representative of Hesse, announced that at some clinics in Germany and France women are paid to do abortions by cesarean section so that the living children can be used for experiments and for the preparation of cosmetics! Doesn't this wretchedness really exceed the brutality of Hilter?!

Describing this despicable social hypocrisy, a contemporary politician spoke to a doctor and advocate of abortion who pretended to have a clean conscience in regard to proceeding with abortions since they are 'embryos' (as if he does not consider the embryos to have their own life) and he observed, "When, my doctor, you don't know if a person is living or dead, you are obligated not to ever give permission for burial." How can doctors today not only give permission for bodies to be buried, but give permission without even knowing they have life?!.. Because no one - after statements of so many doctors and scientists - can credibly argue that he knows that the embryo doesn't have it's own life!

Finally, the argument that the legalization [of abortion] will contribute to the decline [of the number of abortions] reaches the limits of ridiculous when the statistics (and not the false arguments) reveal that the legalization of abortion constitutes the encouragement of abortion, and in places where this went into effect, it stimulated their steep increase. For example, in Japan, it went from 140,000 each year to 1,200,000 per year. In Scandinavia it tripled. In Romania it tripled. In America it multiplied by six. In 'Orthodox' Greece??....

(published in the journal 'Zoe' in June 1985)

The Truth About Abortions, published (in Greek) by Orthodox Kypseli, Thessaloniki, Greece, 2011; page 12-13; translated by OrthodoxProLife.