Slovak church to follow pope’s call

The Slovak Catholic Church is ready to welcome migrants to their parishes. In this way it is reacting to the words of Pope Francis who called on all churches in Europe to accept migrants. The Slovak Catholic church has announced to accept as many as it is possible to accommodate. Nevertheless, it has to wait for the decision of the Slovak government. Martin Kramara, the spokesperson of the Slovak Bishops' Conference: "We will see what we can manage to do. There are about 1500 parishes in Slovakia. Moreover, there are 46 female and 30 male orders. "The Catholic charity organisation helped about 200 migrants last year. If all of the parishes would join the Pope's call, hundreds of people would be sheltered in Slovakia. Bernadetta Mudra, the spokesperson of the Catholic charity organisation: "The main problem we come across is the acute lack of accommodation capacity which would help with the migrants' integration process". The Pope's call was accepted by the church in the Czech Republic and Austria. The churches can help only in co-ordination with governments. The Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka has announced that they will co-operate with the church. Prime Minister Robert Fico: "If there is any parish which would claim that we invite here somebody and that person wants to come over here and is willing to respect our rules, the Slovak Government simply cannot inhibit him from doing that". The Slovak Bishops' Conference will meet regarding the migrant crisis in the middle of September. Apart from the Catholics, the Pope's call has been accepted also by the Slovak Evangelical church which wants to help primarily Christian migrants.