-- this time not from atheist celebrities, but (
here) from "ordinary" Catholics -- including CV Neil D'Aguiar (photo).
We welcome His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to the UK as both head of state of the Holy See and as leader of the world's 1 billion Catholics and to the Catholic community of this country. We believe that his presence here comes at an urgent and pressing time, highlighting the trends in our country that serve only to denigrate human rights and human dignity. We support him wholeheartedly because in guarding the Deposit of Faith he:
Opposes the destruction of human life in the womb and values human life from conception to natural death
Opposes the trend towards refashioning the institution of marriage, thereby denigrating its inherent stability, rooted in the natural order, as being between one man and one woman.
Opposes the trend in the UK towards testing on human embryos, experimenting upon them and stripping the unborn of dignity, under a deceitful justification that this form of experimentation will yield medical benefits for mankind.
Has worked tirelessly to change the culture of the Catholic church to take very seriously allegations or incidences of child abuse, setting up child protection procedures and policies which now make the Catholic church the safest place for a child to be.
Promotes a vision of humanity which advocates a culture of life, stability, marriage, lifelong fidelity and love in which children are welcomed, rather than destroyed, in which human beings are open to new life, opposing vigorously a culture that treats the possibility of new life with contempt.
Upholds the innate, God-given dignity of all human beings regardless of their sexual orientation or social background and upholds the rights and dignity of society's most vulnerable, the poor, the starving, the outcasts, prisoners, the mentally ill and distressed, the disabled, elderly, sick and all those who are so often disregarded by the rest of society.
