Note #9158 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:
06120 Feb. 22, 2006
Pope says violence over cartoons unjustified
by Kristine M. Crane Religion News Service
VATICAN CITY - After dozens of deaths during protests of cartoons lampooning the Islamic prophet, Pope Benedict XVI has condemned the killings of Christians in the Muslim world, while calling for more respect of religions and their symbols.
In a Feb. 20 meeting with Morocco's new ambassador to the Holy See, Ali Achour, Benedict said, "Intolerance and violence are never justifiable responses to offenses, because they are not responses that are compatible with the sacred principles of religion."
Calling for increased respect of religion, the pope said believers should not be "the object of provocations" that offend religious sensibilities.
Muslim uprisings over the weekend left at least 45 people dead, including a Catholic priest. The outbursts came after a former Italian minister's display of T-shirts bearing cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad.
The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano called the Rev. Michael Gajere, who was killed in Nigeria, "the latest victim of this climate of intolerance" following the Feb. 5 killing of the Rev. Andrea Santoro in Turkey.
"If we tell our own that they do not have the freedom to offend, then we also have to tell the others that they do not have the freedom to destroy us," Vatican Secretary of State Angelo Sodano told Italian government authorities on Monday.
Clashes between Muslims and police near the Italian consulate in Benghazi, Libya, left 11 people dead on Feb. 17.
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi blamed the incident on former Reforms Minister Roberto Calderoli, who donned the controversial T-shirt on Italian state television last Friday.
Calderoli stepped down on Saturday, bowing to government pressure, but defended the T-shirt as a gesture of solidarity with victims of religious fanaticism. He is now under investigation by the Rome Tribunal for "vilification of religious confessions."
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