"Why welcome a ringleader of Iranian persecution and oppression? Khatami was given a bully pulpit even though we know that his 'dialogue' is demagoguery and his version of history doesn't square with the facts," Crouse said Friday.

Hers was the second group to raise similar objections. Just a day earlier, the Assyrian Christians voiced their opposition to Khatami's recent appearance in Chicago.

"I would never have allowed my name to go forward in this process had I not felt that God wanted me to be in this process," Barlowe, who has been in a 24-year relation ship with his partner, Paul Burrows, said at a news conference yesterday in Newark. "I reached that not just (from) my own personal perspective, but through consultation with folks who I find are wise and spiritually oriented and are able to assess things in ways that bring clarity to me.

"In the name of tolerance, your country has had to endure the folly of the redefinition of spouse, and in the name of freedom of choice it is confronted with the daily destruction of unborn children," the Pope said.

The pontiff touched on the highly sensitive issue of whether Catholic politicians can back legislation allowing practices such as gay marriage and abortion even if they are personally opposed to them.

He condemned such behaviour as "false dichotomies."

Khatami said Iran is prepared to discuss the suspension -- both the timing and the scope -- of its uranium enrichment in negotiations.

The former Iranian leader, who was elected on a reform platform but failed to deliver significant change, called the United States a "great" country "with great people, great capacities, and potential" -- language that stood in stark contrast to more than a quarter-century of Iran calling the United States "the Great Satan."