The Archbishop of Zagreb, Cardinal Josip Bozanic, said on Monday that "the Christian vision of existence is in jeopardy" and called for "defending the family" as the "greatest good of society," state agency Hina said.

Celebrating Assumption Day at the Marija Bistrica shrine, he said the assumption of Mary was “deeply rooted among Croatia’s believers” and that the “Christian vision of existence is in jeopardy and under attack from ideologies whose intention is to condition society and the human person.”

Bozanic said that last month in Canada Pope Francis pointed to the danger of “ideological colonisation which was contrary to life’s reality and which tried to eradicate tradition, history and religious ties.”

“In other countries, speaking of the beauty of family, Pope Francis called on us to resist theories which try to impose so-called other forms of family and a different way of looking at man, considering that his original diversity manifests him as a man or a woman. As Pope Francis says, a war is being waged not with weapons but with ideological colonisation which wants to destroy marriage and the family,” Bozanic said.

“Today’s celebration calls on us to be a society open to children,” he said, adding that “there are positive initiatives on that front, but also “arrogant and inhuman decisions and actions by those who belittle children’s real needs and don’t protect human life from conception to natural death.”

Bozanic called for praying in particular for expecting parents as well as for peace in war-torn Ukraine.