Benedict XVI on secularism and Islam

Here is an essay, "The Pope's Easter," by Daniel Henninger, about the Pope's Holy Thursday homily.  Among other things, the essay calls attention to this recent statement by the Pope:

"Attention has rightly been drawn to the danger of a clash of civilizations," said Benedict. "The danger is made more acute by organized terrorism, which has already spread over the whole planet. Its causes are many and complex, not least those to do with political ideology, combined with aberrant religious ideas. Terrorism does not hesitate to strike defenseless people, without discrimination, or to impose inhuman blackmail, causing panic among entire populations, in order to force political leaders to support the designs of the terrorists. No situation can justify such criminal activity, which covers the perpetrators with infamy, and it is all the more deplorable when it hides behind religion, thereby bringing the pure truth of God down to the level of the terrorists' own blindness and moral perversion."

This is also interesting:

In 2003 the government of Slovakia signed a concordat with the Vatican to let doctors and health-care workers in Catholic hospitals decline to participate in abortions as a matter of conscience. This January the EU's Network of Independent Experts on Fundamental Rights (their real name, not an Orwellian satire) ruled Slovakia in violation of its EU "obligations." Translation: Tell those Catholic docs to do abortions or we will hammer you financially. The political tensions split Slovakia's government, and in February it fell.

We may assume the new pope noticed this re-invasion of Slovakia.