The Vatican has sent a letter to the Italian government warning that the draft anti-gay law may violate the 92-year-old Lateran Treaty on the relationship between Rome and the Catholic Church and restrict the freedom of religion in Italy.

On Tuesday, the Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported that the Vatican State Relations Secretary Paul Gallagher wrote to the Roman Embassy in the Holy See expressing his Gay Rights Act The Italian Parliament is under consideration.

The Vatican confirmed that it had delivered a letter to the Italian Embassy in the Holy See last week, but did not comment on its contents. The Vatican’s direct intervention in Italian legal issues is extremely rare, and diplomatic discussions between the city-states and Rome are rarely public.

The protest was against the proposed anti-homophobia legislation-known as the Zan Act, after the center left the legislator Alexandre Rozan who introduced the bill. The letter stated that this would threaten the “freedom of thought” of the church and expressed concern that religious schools would be forced to participate in the new National Day against homophobia.

In 1929, the then Kingdom of Italy and Pope Pius XI signed an agreement called the Lateran Treaty, recognizing the Vatican as an independent state and compensating the Papal State for losses to the Holy See. This agreement was recognized in the Italian Constitution in 1948.

Italy’s existing laws punish crimes committed due to racial or religious discrimination, but they do not provide specific protections based on sexual orientation, gender, and gender identity. Similarly, the Vatican often condemns discrimination, but also expresses concern about gender theories that blur the differences between men and women.

Recognizing gay rights has become a battleground between the left and the right in Italy, and Matteo Salvini, the leader of the anti-immigrant coalition party, has criticized the proposed legislation since it was first introduced last year.

Despite the strong opposition from the Catholic Church, Italy passed a law that recognizes same-sex unions under the leadership of Matteo Renzi’s government in 2016. Union Senator Roberto Calderoli said at the time that any legislator who voted for it would “go to hell.”

On Tuesday, Salvini stated that he was willing to discuss this issue with Enrico Letta, the leader of the center-left Democratic Party, in order to “protect rights, punish discrimination and violence, not succumb to ideology or censorship, and not violate the family. And the school field.”.

A survey released by Eurobarometer last year found that Italy’s acceptance of LGBT people is lower than the European average. 55% of Italians accept gay, lesbian, or bisexual people as prime ministers, compared with 90% in Sweden. 93% are in the Netherlands.