This year’s Pro-Life Week in Germany will be held from 29 April to 6 May on the theme “Entrusted to us from the beginning: human life begins before birth”. Promoted by the German Bishops’ Conference together with the Council of the Evangelical Church (EKD), the Week forms part of a wider programme, begun in 2005 and due to end in 2007, with the title “Children are a blessing and the hope of life”. During the Week, dioceses, parishes and associations, dedicated to the defence of life within the two confessions, will organize numerous events aimed at promoting life. Research findings and analysis in the Western world show that the birth rate is constantly declining: all the more reason why the promoters of the Week intend to encourage public opinion to consider children from conception onwards as a gift and a blessing: they are essential for the future of society and not just from an economic point of view. Pro-Life Week will be jointly presented at a press conference in Berlin on 29 March by the President of the German Bishops’ Conference, Cardinal Karl Lehmann, and the President of the EKD, Bishop Wolfgang Huberat. The Week will officially open in Stuttgart on 29 April.
