(VATICAN CITY) - Some 150 Italian gays protested in the Vatican on Saturday against Pope Benedict's adversity to equal marriage of same-sex couples, on the anniversary of the protest suicide of a gay man in St Peter's Square nine years ago. Gay people from the Italian gay organization Arcigay and other groups reportedly waved rainbow flags and disclosed banners telling "No to the Taliban! No to the Vatican!".
Pope Benedict has repeatedly offended gay people by claiming in recent addresses that changes in legislation recognizing same-sex unions would support "those ruinous theories that strip all relevance from the masculinity and femininity of the human being."
Arcigay members laid flowers at the spot in St Peter's Square where writer Alfredo Ormando set himself on fire in 1998, in protest at the Vatican's stance against gays. He died of his burns nine days later.
