Pope highly critical of Spain’s liberal laws

POPE Benedict XVI strongly defended traditional families and the rights of the unborn, directly attacking Spanish laws that allow gay marriage, fast-track divorce and easier abortions as he dedicated Barcelona’s iconic basilica, the Sagrada Familia.

It was the second time in as many days that Benedict had criticised the policies of Spain’s Socialist government and called for Europe as a whole to rediscover Christian teachings and apply them to everyday life.

As he headed to the basilica, about 200 gays and lesbians staged a “kiss-in” to protest at his visit and church policies that consider homosexual acts “intrinsically disordered”. Later, a few hundred women marched to protest over their second-class status in the Church and the Vatican’s opposition to birth control.

Benedict has focused much of his pontificate on trying to fight secular trends in the West such as the legal recognition of same-sex unions. He has visited Spain twice and has a third trip planned next year, an indication he sees this once staunchly Roman Catholic country as a battleground for the future of the faithful in Europe.

During his homily yesterday, Benedict noted that the church of the Sagrada Familia – a soaring, Art Nouveau marvel with sandcastle-like spires – was initially conceived of as a temple to the sacred family of its name, Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

He railed against same-sex marriage and divorce, saying families are built on the “indissoluble love of a man and a woman” who should be provided with financial and social benefits from governments. He criticised policies allowing for abortions, saying “the life of children must be defended as sacred and inviolable from the moment of their conception”.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero’s Socialist government has supported a legislative agenda that has deeply angered the Vatican, allowing gay marriage, quicker divorces and abortions.

On Saturday, Benedict blasted such policies, saying today’s “aggressive” anti-church, secular movement in Spain was reminiscent of the 1930s, when the church suffered violent persecution as the country lurched from an unstable democracy to civil war. Benedict was to meet privately with Zapatero at the airport before departing yesterday, a low-profile event that reflected their divergent views.

In his homily yesterday, Benedict again called for the West to embrace God and shun secular trends. He said the dedication of the Sagrada Familia church was of great importance “at a time in which man claims to be able to build his life without God, as if God had nothing to say to him”.

During the ritual-filled dedication ceremony, Benedict poured holy oil over the altar and spread it across all four corners with his hands, an apron protecting his vestments. Priests then smudged oil on the basilica’s walls. Benedict lit a brass incense burner on the altar as Spain’s King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia looked on.

Afterward, four nuns dressed in black mopped up the remaining oil from the altar.

The church, which was declared a basilica, is the masterwork of Antoni Gaudi, a Barcelona architect and staunch Catholic who dedicated his life to the project but died in 1926, only a few years after it was begun. He is on the path to possible sainthood.

Sergi Benavent, a 22-year-old nursing student, said he joined the “kiss-in” to show his opposition to those “who want to love in just one way”.

At a feminist march, a banner read: “Condoms save, the pope damns.”