Join the 'Protest the Pope' March Against The State Visit of Pope Ratzinger

The Big Pope-Nope march through London that is the centre-piece of the Protest the Pope campaign, will take place on Saturday 18 September at 1:30pm in London – on the same day and near where the pope will be preaching in Hyde Park. See details.

This will be the main opportunity to show the strength of feeling against the Vatican’s inhumane and damaging policies. It is your opportunity to show solidarity with the tens of thousands of children that have been raped by Catholic priests around the world, and many more have been physically and psychologically abused. Given he was Prefect in charge of discipline since 1981, not one person knows more about child abuse in his Church than Benedict, yet he had the cheek to stand on the plane coming to Britain and tell journalists that he was “shocked” by the revelations, as though he had only just found out about them.

Yet he has enabled many of the abusers to escape punishment and go on to reoffend. He has obstructed justice and protected his clergy, especially the more senior ones, from the consequences they should have suffered for their inactions or actions. He must be called to account.

You can show your disapproval of Ratzinger by protesting against the legal bans that the Vatican has fought for on abortion and stem cell research. And also for his obdurate, and breathtakingly irresponsible, opposition to contraception. It fuels a population growth that is unsustainable. Women in poverty-stricken circumstances in countries with dwindling resources are doomed to have large families that they cannot support and who frequently starve. And his using all means, even dishonest ones, to prevent condom use causing untold numbers to die unnecessarily of AIDS because the only known barrier against the disease, condoms, is denied to them.

People from around the country will also be coming to decry Benedict’s constant defamation and insults of gay people. He calls gay relationships — however loving and committed they may be — ‘intrinsically disordered’ and ‘morally evil’. He even says that sympathising with gay people who are being persecuted is a sin. Make no mistake, the Vatican has declared war on gay people and this is the time to start the fightback.

If we don’t turn out in numbers, it will be assumed that few people care about the pope’s vile teachings – it could even be seen as a tacit acceptance of them. That’s why we must all make every effort to be there.

Full details of the march and speakers at the rally

The march also promises to be a lot of fun!