By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Writer

In his address on Good Friday, Pope Benedict XVI spoke out against increasing secularism in the West, warning that it could turn into a “desert of godlessness.”

“Jesus is humiliated in new ways even today when things that are most holy and profound in the faith are being trivialised, the sense of the sacred is allowed to erode,” he said. “Values and norms that held societies together and drew people to higher ideals are laughed at and thrown overboard. Jesus continues to be ridiculed.”

He also addressed attempts to remove religion from public life, saying this was akin to the way the mob mocked Jesus before His crucifixion. “Religious sentiments … [are seen as] unwelcome leftovers of antiquity … held up to scorn and ridicule,” he said. ““We are shocked to see to what levels of brutality human beings can sink.”

The Pope was speaking at Good Friday services which were held in the Coliseum in Rome. Earlier in the day, he visited survivors from the L’Aquila earthquake which left at least 289 people dead.

The Pope, who will turn 82 on April 16, also used his address to speak out against injustice against women and prayed that Christians would grow in faith in response to rising secularism.

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