Men and women who get married and start a family should “receive decisive support from the State”, the Pope said on his visit to Spain at the weekend.

He also warned of the dangers of “aggressive secularism” which he said is now the strongest it has been in Spain since the 1930s.

Speaking in Barcelona at the Sagrada Familia church on Sunday, the Pope said that Jesus taught people “of the dignity and the primordial value of marriage and the family, the hope of humanity, in which life finds its welcome from conception to natural death.”

He stated that “the generous and indissoluble love of a man and a woman is the effective context and foundation of human life in its gestation, birth, growth and natural end.”

The Pope affirmed the Church’s stance in favor of appropriate measures “so that the lives of children may be defended as sacred and inviolable from the moment of their conception,” and “that the reality of birth be given due respect and receive juridical, social and legislative support.”

His words come as observers point to the increasing pressures faced by traditional marriage in Spain.

The Socialist government has introduced a range of measures since 2005, such as easier divorce, same-sex marriage, and a more liberal abortion law.

According to offiical figures, the number of divorces recorded in 2006, the year after the law was changed to make divorce easier, rose by 74 per cent compared to the year before.

At the time, Leopoldo Vives, of the Spanish Episcopal Conference, said: “It costs less to get a divorce than to change your phone number … which is neither good for the people [involved] nor for society.” Before the new law, Spain had one of the lowest divorce rates in Europe.

“The Church,” continued the Pope, “resists every form of denial of human life and gives its support to everything that would promote the natural order in the sphere of the institution of the family.”

The Pope also warned of the dangers of aggressive secularism in Spain. In conversation with journalists before arriving in Spain, Benedict noted that “laicism, a strong and aggressive secularism was born in Spain, as we saw in the 1930s”.

He added: “This dispute is happening again in Spain today. The future of faith and the relations between faith and secularism have Spanish culture as its epicenter.

“The clash between faith and modernity is happening again, and it is very strong today.”

The Pope called for a “‘meeting between faith and secularism that does not clash” as they do today. Referring to Spain, he spoke of a “very strong clash ” underway “between faith and modernity” and called for dialogue and not confrontation.