Presedintele Boliviei ii face cadou Papei Francisc un crucifix cu insemnele comuniste | Pope Francisc receives a crucifix with sikle and hammer from Bolivian President

Papa Francis a primit de la presedintele Boliviei , Evo Morales, un crucifix ce are forma simbolului comunist secerea si ciocanul.

While Pope Francis said : "This is not right" and that he is not amused, Bolivians officials explained that the gift was a replica of a crucifix made by Father Luis Espinal, a human-rights activist who was killed by a paramilitary death squad in 1980. The Pope had earlier prayed at the site of the murder of his fellow Jesuit en route to the presidential palace.

On his arrival, Pope Francis stressed the role of the Church in Bolivian society, saying the faith “has continued to shed its light upon society, contributing to the development of the nation and shaping its culture”.

Those words were a clear message to his host. After his election in 2006, Mr Morales, an indigenous Indian, adopted a confrontational approach towards the Roman Catholic Church to which he once referred as his “main enemy”.

He has frequently criticised its role in the colonisation of the continent, ordered the Bible and cross to be removed from the presidential palace and made the country a secular state.

Indeed, all official ceremonies in Bolivia are now preceded by rituals venerating the Andean earth goddess Pachamana. "I remain convinced that we Bolivians have a double religion, double faith," the president said in January. "We are Catholics, but at the same time we have rituals of our own."

But his attitude toward the Church changed radically when Francis became pope. He has been keen to cultivate good relations with a religious leader who is widely perceived as a champion of the poor and oppressed and indeed Mr Morales has twice visited him at the Vatican.

The gift ceremony was not his first awkward encounter with a pope. When he met in 2010 with Francis' predecessor, Benedict XVI, he gave him a letter suggesting the church abolish celibacy and allow women to be priests.