Mayor of Rome Condemns Catholic Church's Anti-Gay Stance

As usual, the Catholic Church is endeavoring to interfere with Italian civil law which the Church wants to match the Church's religious view. Obviously, since Italy has no formal state religion, the civil laws need NOT track the Church's position. Like the Christianists in this country, The Catholic Church has real issues with the concept of separation of church and state. Via Towleroad, here is a brief story highlight(http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=55603):

Rome, Dec. 27, 2007 (CWNews.com) - The mayor of Rome has criticized a prominent Catholic political leader for opposing gay-rights legislation. In an open letter to the newspaper La Stampa Mayor Walter Veltroni chided Dr. Paola Binetti for her resistance against legislation that would bar discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

Veltroni is the leader of Italy's new Democratic party (PD). Binetti is a leading member of the same party's teodem wing, which upholds Christian moral principles. “Homosexuality is a human condition," Veltroni argued in his letter to La Stampa, "and the PD is working to recognize the rights of homosexual couples.”

The a rough translation of the mayor's letter is here: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.lastampa.it/&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3DLa%2BStampa%2B%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7DGUS