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KIM LAWTON: Pope John Paul II's personal envoy, Cardinal Pio Laghi, came to Washington with a message the Vatican has emphasized over and over again in recent weeks. At a Washington, D.C. Ash Wednesday service, the cardinal repeated what he had told President Bush a few hours earlier:
Cardinal PIO LAGHI (at homily): War is always a defeat for humanity.
LAWTON: In a 40-minute closed-door session with the president, Laghi reiterated the Vatican's opposition to war with Iraq and said any decision about military force must be made through the United Nations.
Afterward, the cardinal told us he still believes there is no moral justification for a U.S.-led attack against Iraq.
Cardinal LAGHI: A preventive war is not possible. It's immoral. It's not just.
LAWTON: Laghi described his meeting with the president as frank, but cordial.
Cardinal LAGHI (speaking at the National Press Club): He was interested, let me put it in that way. He was listening to me.
(Unidentified reporter): Persuaded?
Cardinal LAGHI: Ah, persuaded? You'll have to ask him.
ARI FLEISHER (White House Spokesman): The president thinks the most immoral act of all would be if Saddam Hussein were to somehow transfer his weapons to terrorists who could use them against us.
LAWTON: Jim Nicholson is U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican.
(To Mr. Nicholson): Has it damaged the relationship?
JIM NICHOLSON (U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican): No, the relationship is very strong because we have such a foundation of common values.
LAWTON: Laghi's mission was the latest in a series of Vatican diplomatic initiatives to avert war. The pope has met with several key international leaders, and he dispatched another personal envoy to Baghdad to meet with Saddam Hussein. The U.S. Catholic Bishops have also expressed their serious concerns that war would not meet the traditional just war criteria.
Cardinal PIO LAGHI (at homily): War is always a defeat for humanity.
LAWTON: In a 40-minute closed-door session with the president, Laghi reiterated the Vatican's opposition to war with Iraq and said any decision about military force must be made through the United Nations.
Afterward, the cardinal told us he still believes there is no moral justification for a U.S.-led attack against Iraq.
Cardinal LAGHI: A preventive war is not possible. It's immoral. It's not just.LAWTON: Laghi described his meeting with the president as frank, but cordial.
Cardinal LAGHI (speaking at the National Press Club): He was interested, let me put it in that way. He was listening to me.
(Unidentified reporter): Persuaded?
Cardinal LAGHI: Ah, persuaded? You'll have to ask him.
ARI FLEISHER (White House Spokesman): The president thinks the most immoral act of all would be if Saddam Hussein were to somehow transfer his weapons to terrorists who could use them against us.
LAWTON: Jim Nicholson is U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican.
(To Mr. Nicholson): Has it damaged the relationship?
JIM NICHOLSON (U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican): No, the relationship is very strong because we have such a foundation of common values.
LAWTON: Laghi's mission was the latest in a series of Vatican diplomatic initiatives to avert war. The pope has met with several key international leaders, and he dispatched another personal envoy to Baghdad to meet with Saddam Hussein. The U.S. Catholic Bishops have also expressed their serious concerns that war would not meet the traditional just war criteria.
GEORGE WEIGEL (Ethics and Public Policy Center): When a demonstratively aggressive regime acquires weapons of mass destruction -- not for purposes of deterrence, but for purposes of attack -- it is legitimate to say, in moral terms, this is an aggression under way to which there is a morally legitimate claim to response.
Cardinal LAGHI: We are playing all cards possible in favor of peace, against the war.
