Christodoulos back on the warpath
The Church of Greece has not abandoned its fight to keep the religious belief slot on state identity cards, and believes that the matter will influence the outcome of the next parliamentary elections, Archbishop Christodoulos warned on Sunday. «We are not prepared to give up our identity,» Christodoulos said in an interview with the Sunday Eleftheros Typos newspaper. «The Church judges time by different measures than those used by worldly governments. It has no four-year limit, nor does it fear elections.» Following the government decision, in 2000, to remove – on grounds of privacy protection – religious faith along with other information carried on state ID cards, the Church organized two large protest rallies and launched a petition for a referendum on the matter. It said 3 million people signed during the six-month campaign. Christodoulos said the signatories constituted «a voice that nobody is worthy to despise.» Earlier this month, he claimed that, «had the Church but lifted its finger,» it would have drawn over twice as many signatories. «If it wants to, the people can change state decisions,» he said in Sunday’s interview. «The identity card issue arises of its own volition ahead of the next parliamentary elections. Parties cannot seek the people’s vote and at the same time ignore the will of 3 million voters. They must honestly inform the electorate what they will do after the elections on the ID card issue.» He added that parties should also clarify their stance on abortions, drugs, organ transplants and in-vitro fertilization. Polls are not due until the spring of 2004.
