Services for Norwegian victims today in St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague

There will be a religious service for the victims of the terrorist attacks in Norway in the early evening today in St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague. Right-wing extremist Anders Behring Breivik murdered at least 76 people a week ago by planting a bomb in the center of Oslo and then shooting at a youth meeting on Utöya island.

The services will be attended by the Norwegian Ambassador to the Czech Republic, Jens Eikaas, and will be led by Prague Archbishop Dominik Duka. In a letter of condolence sent to the Norwegian Ambassador, the archbishop expressed his deep feelings of anger, shock, sorrow and most of all, sympathy. “I would like to express my deep sympathy in the name of the entire Czech Catholic Church and to send you our prayers for the deceased and the survivors,” Duka’s letter said.

Breivik confessed to his actions after being detained on Friday but will not acknowledge their criminal nature. In a manifesto published online just before he committed the massacre, he called himself a martyr for a conservative revolution which will cleanse Europe of the left wing and members of other cultures. With only a few exceptions, his crimes have been universally condemned.