Benedict is well known to have a special dislike of “paganism”. In a previous encyclical letter, SPE SALVI, On Christian Hope (1997) he asserts that Catholicism offers more hope for the future than polytheism with its “contradictory myths” -

“Paul reminds the Ephesians that before their encounter with Christ they were “without hope and without God in the world” (Eph 2:12). Of course he knew they had had gods, he knew they had had a religion, but their gods had proved questionable, and no hope emerged from their contradictory myths. Notwithstanding their gods, they were “without God” and consequently found themselves in a dark world, facing a dark future …”

In the new encyclical he returns to his criticism of paganism, this time citing its particular reverence for Nature –

“…it is contrary to authentic development to view nature as something more important than the human person. This position leads to attitudes of neo-paganism or a new pantheism — human salvation cannot come from nature alone, understood in a purely naturalistic sense…”