Beijing Olympics: Pope disappoints Muslim leaders with Jordan address

Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday urged inter-faith reconciliation on the second day of a Holy Land tour but disappointed Muslim clerics by failing to offer a new apology for remarks seen as targeting Islam.

The pontiff in a keynote address to Muslim leaders in Amman's huge Al-Hussein Mosque bemoaned "ideological manipulation of religion" and urged Muslims and Christians to unite as "worshippers of God."

"Certainly, the contradiction of tensions and divisions between the followers of different religious traditions, sadly, cannot be denied," the leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics told his audience.

"However, is it not also the case that often it is the ideological manipulation of religion, sometimes for political ends, that is the real catalyst for tension and division, and at times even violence in society?"

Some clerics expressed disappointment however that the pontiff in his wide-ranging speech had made no new apology for a 2006 address in which he quoted a medieval Christian emperor who criticised some teachings of the Prophet Mohammed as "evil and inhuman."

The pontiff apologised at the time for the "unfortunate misunderstanding" but ahead of his visit to Jordan the kingdom's main opposition party, the Islamic Action Front, said the pope was not welcome unless he again apologised.

"What the pope said was not an apology," said Hammam Said, the overall leader of Jordan's Muslim Brotherhood and University of Jordan professor.

Other Muslim leaders echoed his comments. "We wanted him to clearly apologise," Sheikh Yusef Abu Hussein, mufti of the southern city of Karak, told AFP after the pope's address.

But Prince Ghazi bin Mohammed, Jordanian King Abdullah II's advisor on religious affairs who hosted the pontiff during his visit to the mosque, was more conciliatory.

"I would like to thank you for expressing regret over the lecture in 2006, which hurt the feelings of Muslims," Ghazi told the pope.

"We realise that the visit to Jordan comes as a goodwill gesture and a sign of mutual respect between Muslims and Christians."

Pope Benedict did not remove his shoes during the keynote address at the mosque, as is customary in Muslim shrines, but a spokesman insisted he had not been asked to do so as he used a special walkway.

"Benedict XVI was ready to take them off but his escorts led him down a special walkway and did not ask him to do so," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said.

On his arrival in Amman on Friday at the start of his eight-day Holy Land tour that will also take him to Israel and the Palestinian territories, Benedict underlined his "deep respect" for Islam.

Pressing the theme of reconciliation during a visit earlier on Saturday to Mount Nebo, where Biblical tradition says God showed Moses the Promised Land, Benedict urged Christians and Jews to bridge their divides.

"The ancient tradition of pilgrimage to the holy places also reminds us of the inseparable bond between the Church and the Jewish people," Benedict said.

"May our encounter today inspire in us a ... desire to overcome all obstacles to the reconciliation of Christians and Jews," the pontiff added on the slopes of the windswept mountain, 40 kilometres 24 miles southwest of Amman.

Israel reviles Pius for what it perceives as his passive stance during the Holocaust in World War II.

Migrant workers at a construction site downtown Shanghai May 9, 2009. REUTERS/Aly Song