{"id":251857,"date":"2021-08-29T15:45:35","date_gmt":"2021-08-29T20:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=251857"},"modified":"2021-08-27T16:26:15","modified_gmt":"2021-08-27T21:26:15","slug":"pro-lifers-germany-educate-hostile-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/pro-lifers-germany-educate-hostile-culture\/","title":{"rendered":"Pro-lifers in Germany seek to educate and motivate others in midst of hostile culture"},"content":{"rendered":"
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For years, the pro-life movement in Germany has faced numerous challenges. Though the country has 80 million people, its largest pro-life group, Aktion Lebensrecht f\u00fcr Alle (ALfA),\u00a0numbers<\/a> just 11,000 members. Those who are willing to talk about abortion at all are overwhelmingly likely to be in support of it.<\/p>\n

Another likely contributing factor to the national hush surrounding abortion is that fewer people are identifying as Christians, let alone practicing their religion outwardly. Historically, the government and the courts have not been particularly friendly to a pro-life presence<\/a> outside abortion facilities. Throw in raucous and sometimes violent pro-abortion counter-protesters<\/a>\u00a0all but certain to show up at any public pro-life event, and pro-lifers in Germany face a daunting uphill battle to awaken consciences and change minds about the genocide occurring in their country today.<\/p>\n

And yet, inspired by the tactics and successes of the pro-life movement in America, a small but growing number of Germans is becoming increasingly bold in the efforts to turn the tide of public opinion.<\/p>\n

A recent WORLD article<\/a> about the pro-life movement in Germany summarized both the current state of affairs as well as reasons for hope there. American-born Alicia D\u00fcren now lives there with her German husband and three children. When she attended a pro-life event for the first time in June of 2019, she was struck that there were just as many pro-abortion counter-protesters as pro-lifers, and recalled that their seething rage was palpable.<\/p>\n

She told WORLD, “It was really, really my first confrontation with people who just hate life.” But rather than being cowed by her experience, D\u00fcren commented, “From that event, which was pretty traumatic for me, I realized there was really a need to do something \u2026 here in Germany.”<\/p>\n

READ:<\/strong>\u00a0German court allows ban on pro-life prayer vigil at abortion center to stand<\/em><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

D\u00fcren was disappointed to find that by and large pro-lifers in Germany are often “too quiet. They\u2019re mostly Christian people who are just nice people who don\u2019t want to hurt anyone\u2019s feelings.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cornelia Kaminski, who heads ALfA, has found that pro-life beliefs are hugely unpopular, stating bluntly, “When you\u2019re pro-life in Germany, you\u2019re a freak.” While in America, minority groups are often treated with deference, tolerance, or even a fair hearing, such treatment is far from common for pro-lifers in Germany. According to WORLD, Kaminski “described pro-abortion protesters grabbing pro-lifers\u2019 posters, throwing crucifixes in the river, and yelling that Mary should have aborted baby Jesus.”<\/p>\n

Both D\u00fcren and Kaminski cited the pro-life movement in America as galvanizing their own efforts. D\u00fcren and her husband, Andreas, recently formed a pro-life group called Sundays for Life<\/a>, patterning their name on environmental activist Greta Thunberg’s Fridays for Future group. Sundays for Life organizes weekly public demonstrations on the town square in Augsburg utilizing pro-life signs, including signs with graphic abortion images on them. Surprisingly, for a country where denying the occurrence of the Holocaust is actually illegal, visual reminders of the ongoing genocide of preborn human beings fell out of favor almost 30 years ago after the media misconstrued their use as a coercion tactic to pressure women. Sundays for Life now attracts up to 30 people each time.<\/p>\n

And in 2020, the group took to social media, seeking to replicate the efforts of organizations like Live Action, whose viral abortion procedures videos spurred them to film a similar video in German with voiceover by a German gynecologist. Sundays for Life’s social media efforts have already been rewarded with some 17,000 followers online.<\/p>\n