The Pope vs. Osama bin Laden

Osama bin Laden’s contention that Pope Benedict XVI had played a role in a worldwide campaign against Islam is “baseless,” the Vatican said Thursday.

When Benedict led a Holy Thursday ceremony in Rome’s St. John in Lateran Basilica in the evening, there was no noticeable step-up in already heavy Vatican security for the pontiff’s public appearances.

The Italian Interior Ministry’s anti-terrorism committee planned to analyze bin Laden’s message in a meeting Friday, the ANSA news agency reported.

It is the middle of Holy Week and the pontiff is scheduled to lead several public ceremonies, including a Good Friday procession at Rome’s Colosseum and Easter Masses in St. Peter’s Basilica and St. Peter’s Square.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said it wasn’t surprising that bin Laden had mentioned the pope in a new audio tape posted late Wednesday on a militant Web site.

“He was already named in previous messages,” Lombardi told The Associated Press by telephone. “It is absolutely baseless (to accuse) the pope of contributing to a lack of respect toward Islam” and its prophet, Muhammad, Lombardi said.

In the tape, bin Laden warned of a “severe” reaction for Europe’s publication of cartoons depicting the prophet and said they were part of a “new Crusade” against Islam in which Benedict had played a “large and lengthy role.”

Lombardi noted that the pope and the Vatican have criticized the cartoons on several occasions.

In 2006, after the caricatures were first published in a Danish newspaper, the Vatican said the cartoons represented an “unacceptable provocation,” and that the right to freedom of expression “cannot entail the right to offend the religious sentiment of believers.”

The pope later said religious symbols must be respected, but he also condemned as unjustified the violent protests in Muslim countries that followed the publication of the cartoons.

In Denmark, the co-chairman of the Danish Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee said he takes the threats from bin Laden seriously.

“There are many extremists who listen to him,” said Karsten Lauritzen. But he pointed out that it wasn’t the first time bin Laden has denounced the cartoons.

“Denmark has not been mentioned by name this time,” Lauritzen said, adding that he does not think it necessary to step up security even more.

“This is the price we pay for living in a democracy,” he said.

Germany’s interior ministry told The Associated Press that there has been no decision to step up security levels after the message and that the message’s authenticity was being investigated.

Benedict has recently taken steps to improve relations with moderate Islam.

In November, he will meet Muslim religious leaders for a seminar that was organized after 138 Muslim scholars and intellectuals wrote to Benedict and other Christian leaders to encourage Christians and Muslims to develop their common ground of belief in one God.

In a 2006 speech in Germany that angered many in the Muslim world, Benedict cited a medieval text that characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as “evil and inhuman,” particularly “his command to spread by the sword the faith.”

The pope later said he was “deeply sorry” about the reactions his remarks sparked and stressed that they didn’t reflect his own opinions.