Vatican decries reaction to pope's condom remarks

AP ^ | April 17 2009 | NICOLE WINFIELD

[malkee]

VATICAN CITY – Critics of the Catholic Church's social teachings are trying to intimidate Pope Benedict XVI into silence, the Vatican charged Friday in responding to attacks on the pontiff's remarks about AIDS and condom use.

In a strongly worded statement, the Vatican defended the pope's view that condoms aren't the answer to Africa's AIDS epidemic and could make it worse. On his way to Africa last month, he said the best strategy is the church's effort to promote sexual responsibility through abstinence and monogamy.

France, Germany, the United Nations' AIDS-fighting agency and the British medical journal The Lancet called the remarks irresponsible and dangerous. The Belgian parliament passed a resolution calling them "unacceptable" and demanded Belgium's government officially protest.

Belgium's ambassador to the Holy See lodged the formal protest Wednesday, prompting the Vatican Secretariat to issue its tough statement denouncing the Belgian vote.

The Vatican deplored "the fact that a parliamentary assembly should have thought it appropriate to criticize the Holy Father on the basis of an isolated extract from an interview, separated from its context."

It said Benedict's remarks to reporters had been "used by some groups with a clear intent to intimidate, as if to dissuade the pope from expressing himself on certain themes of obvious moral relevance and from teaching the church's doctrine."

[pnh102]

Go Pope Go!

[ConorMacNessa]

Bravo, B-XVI!

Lamh Foistenach Abu!

[HiTech RedNeck]

Well it is true. Condom programs in Africa are a boondoggle, and Africa needs to learn sexual virtue. So much of African AIDS transmission is through rape which often is abetted by superstitious beliefs (e.g. that raping someone will rid you of AIDS).

[wombtotomb]

Thank you Papa xoxo

[PLK]

The Pope is absolutely right, and science backs him. Even Planned Parenthood realized the folly of giving people the false idea that a condom provides absolute protection, their new slogan includes the phrase "safer sex" in place of the old "safe sex." I laughed when I saw the change in posters that are plastered all over the university campus where I work. Ha ha.

[Tanniker Smith]

People roll their eyes when my response to “they’re going to do it anyway” is “they’re going to it anyway without the condoms”. If you can train them to use condoms you can train them to use their brains.

[PLK]

I agree. Using a condom is better than unprotected sex. But it should be promoted with the disclaimer that it's inferior to monogamous sex within a committed relationship. It's second-best, but better than nothing. True.

(However, I wouldn't trust my life to a condom. No way.)

[Tanniker Smith]

I’ve wanted to ask students (I’m a math teacher, I refer them to their Health teachers — protecting myself), “Would you have sex with someone that you knew for a fact had full-blown AIDS as long as you had a condom?”

[Salvation]

Didn’t you know that the media hates Catholics? Especially the very orthodox believing Pope?