Religious Liberty Has Public Dimension, Says Pope

Religious Liberty Has Public Dimension, Says Pope

During New Italian President's First Official Visit to Vatican

VATICAN CITY, NOV. 20, 2006 (Zenit.org).- During Italian President Giorgio Napolitano's first official visit to the Vatican, Benedict XVI stressed that authentic religious freedom is not simply the absence of violence against believers.

The Pope explained to his guest, who arrived to the Vatican accompanied by his wife and a group of high-level governmental officials, that the religious dimension also has a public dimension which must be guaranteed.

"The Church and the state, though fully different, are both called, according to their respective missions and with their own ends and means, to serve man who is at once the end and participant of the salvific mission of the Church and citizen of the state, and they collaborate in promoting his integral good," the Holy Father said.

At the same time, "man appears before the state with his religious dimension, which consists before all else in those internal, voluntary and free acts whereby man sets the course of his life directly toward God," the Pontiff said, quoting from the Second Vatican Council declaration "Dignitatis Humanae," No. 3.

"No merely human power can either command or prohibit acts of this kind," Benedict XVI added.

The Pope said it is an error "to consider that the right to religious freedom is sufficiently guaranteed when personal convictions suffer no violence or interference, or when we limit ourselves to respecting the expression of faith within the confines of a place of worship."

Social nature

"It cannot, in fact, be forgotten that the social nature of man itself requires that he should give external expression to his internal acts of religion; that he should share with others in matters religious; that he should profess his religion in community," the Holy Father stated.

"Religious freedom is, then, not just of individuals, but also of families, of religious groups and of the Church herself," he indicated, in an address that was broadcast on public television channel RAI 1.

Benedict XVI continued: "An adequate respect of the right to religious freedom implies, then, the commitment of civil authorities in helping to create conditions favorable to the fostering of religious life, in order that the people may be truly enabled to exercise their religious rights and to fulfill their religious duties, and also in order that society itself may profit by the moral qualities of justice and peace which have their origin in men's faithfulness to God and to his holy will.

"The freedom that the Church and Christians claim does not prejudice the interests of the state or of other social groups, and does not seek an authoritative supremacy over them. Rather, it is a condition enabling the fulfillment of the vital service that the Church offers to Italy, and to all other countries in which she is present."