Pope warns against misuse of religion for political ends

Pope Benedict XVI yesterday bemoaned the "ideological manipulation of religion" and urged Muslims and Christians to unite as "worshippers of God".

In a keynote address to Muslim leaders in Amman's huge Al-Hussein Mosque on the second day of a Holy Land tour, the Pope called for inter-faith reconciliation.

"Certainly, the contradiction of tensions and divisions between the followers of different religious traditions, sadly, cannot be denied," the leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics told his audience.

"However, is it not also the case that often it is the ideological manipulation of religion, sometimes for political ends, that is the real catalyst for tension and division, and at times even violence in society?"

Some clerics expressed disappointment that the pontiff, in his wide-ranging speech, had made no new apology for a 2006 address in which he quoted a medieval Christian emperor who criticised some teachings of the Prophet Mohammed as "evil and inhuman".

The pontiff apologised at the time for the "unfortunate misunderstanding" but ahead of his visit to Jordan the kingdom's main opposition party, the Islamic Action Front, said the pope was not welcome unless he apologised again.

"What the Pope said was not an apology," said Hammam Said, the overall leader of Jordan's Muslim Brotherhood and University of Jordan professor said yesterday. "We want the apology to be clear just like the insults to Islam were clear. He should acknowledge his mistakes. That's our position and the position of all Jordanians."

Other Muslim leaders echoed his comments.

"We wanted him to clearly apologise," Sheikh Yusef Abu Hussein, mufti of the southern city of Karak, told AFP after the pope's address.

"We had hoped the pope would take into consideration the feelings of Muslims," said another cleric, Sheikh Jamal Jumaah of the city of Madaba.

Prince Ghazi bin Mohammed, Jordanian King Abdullah II's advisor on religious affairs, who hosted the pontiff during his visit to the mosque, was more conciliatory.

"I would like to thank you for expressing regret over the lecture in 2006, which hurt the feelings of Muslims," Ghazi told the pope.

"We realise that the visit (to Jordan) comes as a goodwill gesture and a sign of mutual respect between Muslims and Christians."

Pope Benedict did not remove his shoes during the keynote address at the mosque, as is customary in Muslim shrines, but a spokesman insisted he had not been asked to do so as he used a special walkway.

"Benedict XVI was ready to take them off but his escorts led him down a special walkway and did not ask him to do so," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said.

On his arrival in Amman last Friday, at the start of his eight-day Holy Land tour that will also take him to Israel and the Palestinian territories, Benedict underlined his "deep respect" for Islam.

Pressing the theme of reconciliation during a visit earlier yesterday to Mount Nebo, where Biblical tradition says God showed Moses the Promised Land, Benedict urged Christians and Jews to bridge their divides.

"The ancient tradition of pilgrimage to the holy places also reminds us of the inseparable bond between the Church and the Jewish people," the Popesaid.

"May our encounter today inspire in us a... desire to overcome all obstacles to the reconciliation of Christians and Jews in mutual respect and cooperation," the pontiff added on the slopes of the windswept mountain, some 40 kilometres southwest of the Jordanian capital Amman.

Tomorrow, the Pope will begin the second stage of his trip by flying to Israel where he is also expected again to focus on building bridges between the faiths.

In recent months, Israel and the Vatican have clashed over the papal decision to lift the excommunication of a Holocaust-denying bishop, Richard Williamson of Britain, and over moves to beatify Pope Pius XII.

Israel reviles Pius for what it perceives as his passive stance during the Holocaust in World War II.