Vandalism in the Catholic cemetery of Chanià, on the Isle of Crete, Greece. It has been reported by mgr. Francesco Papamanolis, bishop of Syros, Santorini and Crete, and president of the Greek Bishops Conference, in a note sent to SIR, in which he states that “for the third time the Catholic cemetery of Chanià, on the Isle of Crete, has been the target of sacrilegious men, who entered the sacred place some night between 3rd and 7th October and outrageously damaged the graves of the dead. Those who were there, on Sunday 7th October, saw an indescribable scene: the graves had been uncovered, the crosses broken, the marble slabs of the graves upturned, the tombstones broken into two. The Catholic cemetery looked like a bombed place. In the French military section of the cemetery – goes on the note -, where the French soldiers who died in the fights for the liberation of Crete (1896-1913) rest, destruction is nothing short of total. Not even one cross has been left standing. Even a monumental tomb that is inside that section has been damaged”. In the past, explains mgr. Papamanolis, “such damages were put down to some unknown drug addicts. As it seems, though, they should instead be put down to people who want to have the Catholic cemetery moved away or disappear from Chanià. To all of them, we say: Respect the memory of the dead. To the Government, but especially to the Ministers of Justice and Police, and to the local authorities, we ask for the protection of the law. When something similar recently happened in the Orthodox Cemetery of Constantinople, our Government turned it into a problem of national relevance. And that was right. But when, on two previous occasions, our Cemetery of Chanià was damaged by sacrilegious people and invading vandals, no authority did anything, they hushed up the problem and did nothing to repair the outrage to the memory of the dead, and they did not even help us compensate the damage. Don’t the bones of the Catholic Christians deserve as much respect as do the bones of our Orthodox brothers? We ask the Ministries of Justice and Police – concludes Papamanolis – to protect us, because the injustices we suffer as a Catholic Church, especially in Crete, are building up and multiplying. For how much longer?”.
