(ANSA) - Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday warned that religious freedom was threatened by relativism and political ideology.
In his weekly sermon to the thousands gathered in St Peter's Square, the pope said that religious freedom is "sometimes denied for religious or ideological reasons, other times, even when it is recognised on paper, its is limited by political power or, in a more subtle way, by a culture of agnosticism and relativism".
Before becoming pope in April, the then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger headed Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and he often spoke out against what he saw as a "dictatorship of relativism which recognises nothing as definitive and leaves only the self and its desires as the ultimate yardstick".
In the Vatican 'relativism' means an attitude which put Catholicism on the same level as other religions, implying that one was as good as another.
The Church's position, which Benedict and his predecessor John Paul II fiercely defended, is that only the Catholic faith can bring salvation.
The pope on Sunday also reiterated the Church's position that every human life, even the most fragile or limited by disabilities, must be protected form its conception to its natural end.
"I call on all of you to always do the most you can to help people with disabilities not only integrate to society and in the workplace, but also in the Christian community, remembering that every human life is worthy of respect and must be protected from its conception until its natural end," he said.
The pope's words coincided with the 30th United Nations' Declaration in the Rights of the Handicapped, which falls on
December 9.
