The Catholic diocese of Rome called on the city's faithful Wednesday to back Pope Benedict XVI against academics who fault the Church leader for positions seen as anti-science. A burgeoning protest against a planned appearance by the pope, who is also the bishop of Rome, at the secular La Sapienza university here prompted Benedict to cancel the engagement, which had been set for Thursday.
Lamenting the "sad events" that led to the cancellation, Rome's vicar Camillo Ruini urged "all believers, but also all Romans," to stage a show of support during the pope's Angelus prayer on Sunday in St Peter's Square.
Already on Wednesday some 5,000 pilgrims attended the pope's weekly general audience, many chanting "freedom."
"The Church of Rome expresses its solidarity with its bishop, the pope, and bears witness to the love, confidence, admiration and gratitude of the people of Rome towards Benedict XVI," Ruini said.
Many scientists criticize the intellectual, conservative pope, a respected theologian, for a series of positions he has taken that they say subordinate science and reason to faith.
The protest against the visit was spearheaded by physicist Marcello Cini, a professor emeritus of La Sapienza, who wrote to rector Renato Guarini complaining of an "incredible violation" of the university's autonomy.
Sixty-seven professors and researchers of the sprawling university's physics department, as well as radical students, joined in the call for the pope to stay away on Thursday, the start of the university's academic year.
Students opposed to the visit kicked off "an anti-clergy week" on Monday by showing a film on Galileo, the 17th-century physicist who ran afoul of Church doctrine by insisting that the Earth orbits the Sun.
Prime Minister Romano Prodi led unanimous denunciations of the protest by Italy's political class, echoed widely Wednesday by the country's main dailies.
Radical students launched a series of protest events, showing a film on Monday about Galileo, the 17th-century physicist convicted by the Inquisition -- the predecessor of the Vatican's doctrinal watchdog that the pope formerly headed as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
It was the first cancellation in the pope's diary since his election in April 2005.
The daily La Repubblica devoted its front page to the issue, bemoaning the fact the pope "can no longer speak to his home-town university in this mediocre Italy of 2008."
Benedict's predecessor John Paul II was loudly heckled when he spoke at La Sapienza in 1991.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.
The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
Sotto Voce