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Archbishop Ieronymos II © WCC/Nikos Kosmidis

Archbishop Ieronymos II © WCC/Nikos Kosmidis

As he visited vastly different places — Berlin and the island of Samos, a Greek island in the eastern Aegean Sea — the Archbishop Ieronymos II of Athens and All Greece made a consistent call for more definitive state action on the refugee crisis.

In Berlin, he urged the European Union (EU) to assume a more active role in alleviating the refugee crisis, which has put a particular strain on Greece because of its position on the EU’s southeastern external border.

“Europe must assume its responsibilities as regards the refugee problem and contribute to tackling the causes that provoked it,” the archbishop said in his official remarks in Berlin. “The Western world has responsibilities for the appearance of the refugee problem.”

He further expressed concerns about the possibility of a large number of refugees being trapped in the Balkans, a development that would turn that region into what he described as “a powder keg.”

Archbishop participates in food distribution on Samos

As he helped deliver food into the hands of people on Samos, the archbishop reiterated his message that refugees have been forced to leave their homes because of the actions of the West.

He released remarks that stated, ““All these refugees are the result of our own actions, the so-called western world. We, with our actions, have forced them to abandon their homelands and now we stack them like sheep for slaughter.”

The Archbishop visited the island’s Migrant and Refugee Reception Center. He also spoke about the world’s missed opportunity to try to avoid uprooting people from their homes.

More than 700,000 people have passed through Greece since January. Greece is a main point of entry into the EU for people fleeing war and poverty. The vast majority refugees are reaching the Greek islands from the nearby Turkish coast.

During the past several years, Archbishop Ieronymos has joined faith leaders in criticizing a moral and spiritual degradation that has reached deeply into the heart of the EU and its current economic system.

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