- Controversy caused by differing translations of interview
- Ban remains on condoms for contraception
John Hooper in Rome
Wednesday November 24 2010
guardian.co.uk
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/23/vatican-pope-condom-ruling
The Vatican today broadened the scope of the pope's remarks about the
use of condoms [http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/21/pope-
benedict-edges-away-ban-condoms" title="Benedict's remarks about the
use of condoms] to prevent Aids, apparently opening the way for their
widespread use by Roman Catholics in Africa and other parts of the
world blighted by the disease.
The leaking at the weekend of differently translated passages of a
book of interviews with Benedict XVI generated intense controversy.
According to the German original and the English translation, Benedict
said the use of a condom by an HIV-positive male prostitute could be
a good thing, in that would represent a first step towards an
assumption of responsibility; in the Italian version, however, the
word for a female prostitute was used.
Several commentators, particularly conservative ones, pounced on the
pope's unusual example to claim he was not signalling a change in his
church's opposition to artificial contraception. By referring in the
original to homosexual sex, in which condoms are not used for
contraceptive purposes, it was argued, he was maintaining the ban on
their use in heterosexual relations.
But at a press conference in the Vatican to mark the launch of the
book, the pope's spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, explained that
he had raised this issue with the pope on Sunday.
"I personally asked the pope if there was a serious, important problem
in the choice of the masculine over the feminine," Lombardi said. "He
told me: 'No.'"
Lombardi said the key point was: "It's the first step of taking
responsibility, of taking into consideration the risk of the life of
another with whom you have a relationship ? This is if you're a woman,
a man, or a transsexual."
As several experts have noted, the book, Light of the World, by German
journalist Peter Seewald, cannot alter doctrine. But Father Lombardi's
comments signalled that the pope approved of condom use as a lesser
evil where there was a risk of HIV contagion.
The Catholic ban on the use of condoms, or any other device, for
purely contraceptive purposes remains. One of the pope's most senior
officials, Cardinal Rino Fisichella, told the press conference it was
"intrinsically an evil".
What remains to be seen, however, is whether the Catholic church will
be able to sustain a meaningful distinction between the dual uses of
the condom.
Benedict's comments do not detract from his insistence that abstinence
and fidelity are more important in fighting Aids. On his visit to
Africa last year, he prompted criticism by suggesting the distribution
of condoms could even aggravate the problem.
In Seewald's book, he repeats his view that condoms are "not really
the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection". But, asked whether
his church is opposed in principle to the use of condoms, he gives an
answer that falls well short of a straight yes.
"It of course does not regard it as a real or moral solution. But, in
this or that case, there can be nonetheless, in the intention of
reducing the risk of infection, a first step in a movement toward a
different way, a more human way, of living sexuality."
The pope's shift appeared to have caught unawares even some of his own
most senior officials. Asked by the website of the US-based National
Catholic Register whether Benedict's statement indicated that in some
cases condoms were permissible, Cardinal Raymond Burke replied flatly:
"No, it's not."
Cardinal Burke, who heads the Vatican's highest appeals court, said
the pope was "simply making the comment that [if] a person who is
given to prostitution at least considers using a condom to prevent
giving the disease to another person - even though the effectiveness
of this is very questionable ? this could be a sign of someone who is
having a certain moral awakening. But in no way does it mean that
prostitution is morally acceptable, nor does it mean that the use of
condoms is morally acceptable."
guardian.co.uk Copyright (c) Guardian News and Media Limited. 2010
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