Home
Politics
"Speaking about this crisis in apocalyptic terms, to me, seems excessive...last year was a year of communication success stories (for the Vatican)," Lombardi told the Catholic newspaper ZENIT, referring to the papal visits to France, the United States and Australia.
He urged journalists covering the Vatican "to look at the big picture and maintain objectivity".
Williamson, a member of the ultra-conservative Society of Saint Pius X, caused outrage when he said in a Swedish television interview that he did not believe any Jews were gassed by the Nazis.
"200,000 to 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps, but none of them by gas chambers," he said.
He has since apologised, but the Vatican said Friday that it was not satisfied and called on the British-born bishop to "distance himself absolutely and publicly" from his positions concerning the Holocaust.
Williamson, 68, was among four excommunicated bishops the pope agreed to take back into the Church in January in a bid by the Vatican to heal a split with traditionalist Roman Catholics, who rejected the Church's liberal reforms of the early 1960s.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Image of Federico Lombardi, from Daylife, AP Photo.
He urged journalists covering the Vatican "to look at the big picture and maintain objectivity".
Williamson, a member of the ultra-conservative Society of Saint Pius X, caused outrage when he said in a Swedish television interview that he did not believe any Jews were gassed by the Nazis.
"200,000 to 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps, but none of them by gas chambers," he said.
He has since apologised, but the Vatican said Friday that it was not satisfied and called on the British-born bishop to "distance himself absolutely and publicly" from his positions concerning the Holocaust.
Williamson, 68, was among four excommunicated bishops the pope agreed to take back into the Church in January in a bid by the Vatican to heal a split with traditionalist Roman Catholics, who rejected the Church's liberal reforms of the early 1960s.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Image of Federico Lombardi, from Daylife, AP Photo.
