Rome, Italy, Jan 26, 2011 / 11:12 am
The head of Italy's bishops, Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco of Genoa, painted a dire picture of the current state of Italian public life and politics in a recent speech. Despite the difficulties created by the "present situation," Italians must not give in to pessimism but should shift their attention to "change for the better," he said.
In Cardinal Bagnasco's address to inaugurate the Italian Bishops' Conference's winter gathering in Ancona, Italy on Jan. 24, he celebrated the announcement of John Paul II's coming beatification and voiced support for Pope Benedict XVI's push for more attention to religious freedom in the world.
Most evident, however, was his intense description of the decadence of Italian culture and religion's loss of influence on the national identity and public life.
It is an openness to God that gives man "the ideals and that moral strength that materialism does not guarantee," he said. "Most of all, it makes him able to choose good instead of evil, which for a society is the fundamental and irreplaceable direction."