VATICAN CITY (AP) - A leading cardinal, reflecting on the U.S. military strikes against Afghanistan, said Monday that the Roman Catholic Church opposes violence but nations have the right to self-defense.
Milan Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, in Rome for a monthlong gathering of bishops, expressed worry that ``in trying to eradicate terrorism you run the risk of sparking it or fueling new breeding grounds.''
``The church doesn't give permission to this or that government'' to fight a war, said Martini, who has been seen by some observers as a candidate to be the next pope. ``It can never say `yes' to violence, even while recognizing the right to legitimate defense and that of stamping out the breeding grounds of terrorism.''
Pope John Paul II, according to his spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls, supports efforts to bring to justice those responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, but opposes taking civilian lives in the process.
How to combat terrorism after the attacks ``is a very delicate theme in which you have to be careful to balance various elements,'' Cardinal Martini told reporters.
``Condemnation of terrorism is unanimous among the bishops, as is compassion for the victims and their families, but all that must not distract our attention from the international injustices and the poverty that aren't the immediate cause of terrorism but are in some way the root,'' the cardinal said.
The terrorist attacks, he said, have presented ``a challenge for humanity.'' Martini urged people and nations to see if there are ``roots of injustices and violence'' inside themselves.
His view reflected in part a call for examination of conscience made three weeks earlier by another high-profile cardinal at the bishops' gathering, Archbishop Edward Egan of New York.
The pope invited the bishops to Rome long before the attacks to discuss the role of churchmen in the world, but how to morally respond to the attacks has become a recurrent concern at the Sept. 30-Oct. 27 gathering.