Spanish government perplexed over papal criticism of its policies

Published: 2005-01-27

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Summoning the Vatican ambassador to Spain, the Spanish government expressed its "perplexity" over criticisms Pope John Paul II made Jan. 24 about government policies. Luis Calvo Merino, Spain's undersecretary for foreign affairs, called the nuncio, Archbishop Manuel Monteiro de Castro, in for a Jan. 26 meeting after the pope told Spanish bishops he was concerned about the way the country was moving under the Socialist government of Prime Minister Jose Rodriguez Zapatero. "The Spanish government expressed to the nuncio its perplexity over the explicit reference which the speech contained to a supposed restrictive secularism that could limit religious freedom and which could be attributed to a deliberate attitude of the government," said a Jan. 26 press statement from the Spanish Foreign Ministry. In his speech to the bishops, the pope said that in Spanish society "a mentality inspired by secularism" is gradually leading to "the restriction of religious freedom," seen in a lack of respect for religious values, ignorance about the faith, efforts to "relegate the faith to the private sphere and opposing its expression in public."

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