Posted on 06/26/2007 3:31:21 PM PDT by cpforlife.org
ERLANGEN, Germany, June 26, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A city court in Erlangen, Bavaria, gave Lutheran Pastor Johannes Lerle a one year jail sentence for the “crime” of comparing abortion to the Nazi holocaust.
In response, Jim Hughes, Vice President of International Right to Life Federation has called on pro-life activists internationally to take action on the matter by contacting German authorities to demand freedom of speech and freedom of religion for the pastor (see contact information below story).
Pastor Johannes Lerle compared the annual murder of 150,000 babies through abortion in Germany to the murder of thousands of innocent Jews in Auschwitz. The court, which consisted of no jury and a single judge, ruled that this statement made Lerle a holocaust denier.
On 14 June, Judge Erda Erdenhofner convicted Lerle of a particular crime known as “volksverhetzung”, or “incitement of the people”. Ironically, volksverhetzung was an accusation that was frequently used by the Nazis to convict those with whom the regime disagreed, a slap-conviction that could be used to dispose of inconvenient people.
During his address to the court, Lerle defended himself and claimed that his statement was in no way taking away from the gravity of the sufferings of the Jews.
The German Catholic news service kreuz.net reports that the reason for the severity of the punishment is in part due to the pastor’s six previous convictions, which have seen the pastor serve two prison terms lasting eight and a half months in total. He was formerly imprisoned for calling abortionists and their aides “child murderers.”
Brussels Journal reporter Paul Belien notes that German courts have slammed other pro-life advocates with heavy sentences for similar statements. German pro-life advocate Günter Annen, for example, was reported by the Journal as having called for an end to “unjust abortions” in 2005. She received a 50-day jail sentence on the grounds that her claim that abortion is “unjust” is legally inaccurate. The courts decided that her words wrongly implied that abortion is illegal in Germany.
Other Germans have also faced stiff sentences in the past for using strong language to condemn abortion.
After calling abortuaries places where, “life unworthy of living is being killed,” some were convicted for allegedly choosing similar language to what Hitler used to describe euthanasia under the Nazi regime.
Pope John Paul II underlined the parallel between the Nazi Holocaust and abortion, which he calls “legal extermination,” in his book “Memory and Identity” (2005). He wrote, “It was a legally elected parliament which allowed for the election of Hitler in Germany in the 1930s.” He also pointed out that the same country that declared Jews non-persons less than a century ago has ruled that unborn babies are not persons either (see http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/feb/05022306.html).
Angela T. Wu, International Director of the Becket Fund, an American organization that guards the freedom of religious speech, commented to LifeSiteNews.com, “If these reports are true, this is a harrowing example of a growing trend of government laws that control its citizens’ viewpoints and stifle the free speech rights of religious organizations and practitioners.”
She continued, “Whether or not you agree with the pro-life position, Pastor Lerle and those like him must be allowed to freely espouse his and his church’s views on the issues without fear of government reprisal. While Volksverhetzung laws exist in Germany because of its unique history, that is no excuse for illegally violating the international human right to freedom of belief, which must include the right to profess those beliefs, even those of a controversial nature.”
Calls to the German Embassy in Ottawa for comment were not returned by press time.
To respectfully voice concerns:
President of the Federal Republic of Germany
11010 Berlin
Germany
Tel: +49 30 20 00-0
Fax: +49 030 20 00-19 99
E-Mail: Bundespraesident.Horst.Koehler@bpra.bund.de
Chancellor
Angela Merkel
Willy-Brandt-Straße 1
10557 Berlin
Germany
Tel: +49 180 272-0000
Fax: +49 1888 272-2555
E-Mail: InternetPost@bundesregierung.de
Prime Minister of Bavaria
Dr. Edmund Stoiber
Postfach 220011
80535 München
Germany
Tel: +49 89 / 2165-0
Fax: +49 89 / 29 40 44
E-Mail: ministerpraesident@stk.bayern.de
Minister of Justice in Bavaria
Beate Merk
Prielmayerstr. 7
80335 München
Tel: +49 89 5597 1799
Fax: +49 89 5597 3580
Email: beate.merk@stmj.bayern.de
Mayor of the Town of Erlangen
Dr. Siegfried Balleis
Rathausplatz 1
91052 Erlangen
Germany
Tel: +49 9131 86-0
Fax: +49 9131 86-26 92
Email: ob@stadt.erlangen.de
Local Court Erlangen
Familiengericht
Richterin Frank-Daupin
Mozartstraße 23
91052 Erlangen
Germany
Tel: +49 9131-782 01
Fax: +49 9131/782-361
(No email address available)
German Embassy in Canada
1 Waverley Street
Ottawa, ON, K2P 0T8
Tel: 613-232-1101
Fax: 613-594-9330
Email: germanembassyottawa@on.aibn.com
See related LifeSiteNews coverage:
Pope Compares Abortion to Holocaust in his New Book
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/feb/05022306.html
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In 1970, Nobel Prize winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn observed:
Let us not forget that violence does not and cannot flourish by itself; it is inevitably intertwined with lying. Between them there is the closest, the most profound and natural bond: nothing screens violence except lies, and the only way lies can hold out is by violence.
The more odious the violence, the greater the deceit is needed to justify it. Therefore, the defense of partial-birth abortion has required an inexhaustible store of lies.
"Abortion is murder, plain and simple." -Rabbi Moshe Sternbuch, Da Ma Shetoshiv
bump
Holy Cow! Erlangen was my assignment station overseas. It's a university town so that probably accounts for much of the local sentiment.
Charles will have to answer the question about synods, but I'm not sure they have them over there. I think it's essentially the Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland (EKD), i.e. Protestant Church in Germany.
If we had slipped quite this far in America, I'd be serving a hundred concurrent life sentences by now.
This is astounding.
I’da pinged him but...he’s on vacation, donchyano.
The funny thing is that the so called “church” of scientology charges homosexuals thousands of dollars to “cure” them but homosexuals completely disregard the free teachings of the Bible.
Yeah, I know, but he said he'd be lurkin' so, who knows?
Erlangen was a beautiful city; likely still is. The post I was at is no longer there; I believe most of the complex has been turned into small businesses or living areas.
Lots of good memories there. Lots of good beer, too. Oh, and the strawberry wine, from fresh strawberry farms, was fantastic!
Irony and stupidity know no limits.
Hey, Pastor, are ya lurkin'? This one's for you. Any thoughts on the Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland?
Never heard of them. They’d get thrown out by the courts anyway.
I think on that site it’s stated that per capita, abortion amongst Jews in Israel is higher than any industrialized nation.
CONFESSION OF AN EX-ABORTIONIST http://www.aboutabortions.com/Confess.html By Dr. Bernard Nathanson
I am personally responsible for 75,000 abortions. This legitimizes my credentials to speak to you with some authority on the issue. I was one of the founders of the National Association for the Repeal of the Abortion Laws (NARAL) in the U.S. in 1968....
Beware — the same is coming to America. It’s just a matter of time. As a minister in America, I can foresee the day when I will be arrested in the pulpit for proclaiming homosexuality to be a sin. People have already been arrested in tried in America for it.
bump to post #21, sadly true.
THIS COULD HAPPEN HERE. Senator Feinstein wants to limit our freedom of expression. And some communities have enacted hate speech legislation that forbids criticism of the homosexual agenda.
ping
German Pastor Sentenced to a Year in Jail for Comparing Abortion to the Nazi Holocaust
>Beware — the same is coming to America.<
It’s already here.
Ping! The victim is a Lutheran.
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