Soprano Charlotte Church criticized Pope Benedict XVI's affirmations about the Harry Potter books, who declared a week ago they are "the products of evil".

The Voice of an Angel told The Sun: "I'm from a Catholic family. But I don't like this new Pope - he even wants to ban Harry Potter. He says it's because it's full of witchcraft and other bad stuff."

She added: "If he bothered to sit down and read it, he'd understand the morals of it."

According to comments attributed to Pope Benedict by German writer Gabriele Kuby, the popular series of books by J.K. Rowling are "subtle seductions which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly."

Gabriele Kuby has written a book called "Harry Potter -- Good or Evil", in which attacks J.K. Rowling's best selling series about the boy wizard.