Swedish lifeboats were reported today to be engaged in a search for a 9,000-ton Nazi prison ship, carrying more than 1,000 Jewish deportees from Norway on route to an unknown destination, which, it is feared, may have foundered in a roaring gale 25 miles from Helsingor, Denmark.
The deportation of the Jews from Norway was assailed here yesterday during services at two of Stockholm’s principal cathedrals and at a protest meeting held here last night. At the same time the executive committee of the Swedish Baptist Union appointed a special committee to take up the question of aiding the Jewish victims of the Nazis, especially those in Norway.
Proests voiced by church leaders in Norway were endorsed here by high Swedish clergymen in statements in the press, in broadcasts over the radio and at services in the cathedrals, The Stockholm Moregenbladet today publishes the following statement by Bishop John Collberg: “The Swedish Church wholly backs the protests voiced by the Norwegian Church,” Bishop Gustav Aulen, in a sermon broadcast here, said; “The horrible infection of racial persecution has spread to Scandinavia. There appears to be no limit to the depths to which hatred-blinded people will sink.”
The Gotesborg Cathedral was packed to the doors yesterday when Dean Olle Nystedt said prayers for the deported Norwegian Jews and added; “Sweden cannot remain silent when such things happen close to our frontiers. If we keep silent, the very stones would cry out to high heaven.” At Upsala Cathedral, Archbishop Erling Eiden of the Swedish State Luteran Church, enthroning Manfred Bjorkquist as the new Bishop of Stockholm, said, “Within the Church there is no room for strife between races.”
A huge protest meeting was held in Stockholm yesterday with the following speakers; Zeth Hoglund, former editor of Social-Demokraten; Amilia Fogelklau, noted Swedish writers Natanael Beskow, Doctor of Theology, Lydia Wahlstrom, Swedish feminist leader and author who has been active in many humanitarian causes. The meeting adopted a resolution stating, “In the name of Christiantiy, democracy, humanity and justice, we protest against the mass deportation of Norwegian Jews not for any crimes but for their birth”
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