In an emotional letter on behalf of Pope Benedict XVI to the Knights of Columbus, the Pontiff said that the best response to the attacks against the Church is a greater fidelity to Christ.

The Pope also used the fraternal organization as an example of loyalty to the Catholic Church.

In the letter, read during the first session of the 128th Supreme Convention of the Knights of Columbus in Washington D.C., Cardinal Bertone wrote that “in the face of often unfair and unfounded attacks on the Church and her leaders, His Holiness is convinced that the most effective response is a great fidelity to God’s word, a more resolute pursuit of holiness, and an increased commitment to charity in truth on the part of all the faithful.”

“He asks the Knights to persevere in their witness of faith and charity, in the serene trust that, as the Church embraces this period of purification, her light will come to shine all the more brightly (cf. Mt 5:15-16) before men and women of fair mind and good will,” he added.

“At a time when fundamental moral norms, grounded in truth and inscribed in the human heart, are increasingly called into question and at times overturned by positive legislation,” Cardinal Bertone continued, the Pope “is grateful for the efforts made by the Knights, in cooperation with other men and women of good will, to uphold the reasonableness of the Church’s moral teaching and its importance for a sound, just and enduring social order.”

In the letter addressed to Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson, the Cardinal Secretary of State said that the Holy Father “once more thanks your Order for its witness to the sanctity of human life and the authentic nature of marriage, and for its efforts to promote in the Catholic laity a greater consciousness of the need to overcome every separation between the faith we profess and the daily decisions which shape our lives as individuals and the life of society as a whole.”