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Pope Benedict XVI has opened the door on the
previously taboo subject of condoms as a way to fight HIV, saying
male prostitutes who use condoms may be beginning to act
responsibly. It's a stunning comment for a pontiff who has blamed
condoms for making the AIDS crisis worse.


      The pope made the comments in an interview with a German
journalist published as a book entitled "Light of the World: The
Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times," which is being
released Tuesday. The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano ran
excerpts on Saturday.


      Church teaching has long opposed condoms because they are a form
of artificial contraception, although the Vatican has never
released an explicit policy about condoms and HIV. The Vatican has
been harshly criticized for its position.


      Benedict said that condoms are not a moral solution to stopping
AIDS. But he said in some cases, such as for male prostitutes,
their use could represent a first step in assuming moral
responsibility "in the intention of reducing the risk of
infection."


      Benedict made the comment in response to a general question
about Africa, where heterosexual HIV spread is rampant.


      He used as a specific example male prostitutes, for whom
contraception is not usually an issue, but did not mention married
couples where one spouse is infected. The Vatican has come under
pressure from even church officials to condone condom use for such
monogamous married couples to protect the uninfected spouse from
transmission.


      Benedict drew the wrath of the United Nations, European
governments and AIDS activists when, en route to Africa in 2009, he
told reporters that the AIDS problem on the continent couldn't be
resolved by distributing condoms. "On the contrary, it increases
the problem," he said then.


      Journalist Peter Seewald, who interviewed Benedict over the
course of six days this summer, raised the Africa condom comments,
asking him if it wasn't "madness" for the Vatican to forbid a
high-risk population from using condoms.


      "There may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as
perhaps when a male prostitute uses a condom, where this can be a
first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption
of responsibility," Benedict said.

      Asked if that meant that the church wasn't opposed in principle
to condoms, the pope replied:


      The church "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," according to an English translation of the book
obtained by The Associated Press.


      Elsewhere in the book he reaffirmed church teaching opposing
artificial contraception.


      "How many children are killed who might one day have been
geniuses, who could have given humanity something new, who could
have given us a new Mozart or some new technical discovery?" he
asked rhetorically.


      He reiterated the church's position that abstinence and marital
fidelity is the only sure way to prevent HIV.


      The English publisher of the book, Rev. Joseph Fessio, said the
pope was not justifying condom use as a lesser of two evils.


      "This is not a justification," he said. Rather, "The
intention of protecting the other from disease, of using a condom,
may be a sign of an awakening moral responsibility."


      However, the Rev. Jim Martin, a Catholic writer, said the
comments were certainly a departure, an exception where there had
never been an exception before.


      "While some bishops and archbishops have spoken in this way,
the pope has never affirmed this," Martin said. "And it's
interesting that he uses as an example someone who is trying to act
morally to someone else by not passing on an infection, which was
always the stance of those people who favored condoms in cases of
HIV and AIDS. So it does mark a departure."


      The English translation of the original German specified "male
prostitute." The Italian translation in L'Osservatore Romano,
however, used the feminine "prostitute." The discrepancy wasn't
immediately clear.


      Cardinal Elio Sgreccia, the Vatican's longtime top official on
bioethics and sexuality, elaborated on the pontiff's comments,
stressing that it was imperative to "make certain that this is the
only way to save a life." Sgreccia told the Italian news agency
ANSA that that is why the pope on the condom issue "dealt with it
in the realm of the exceptional."
      The condom question was one that "needed an answer for a long
time," Sgreccia said. "If Benedict XVI raised the question of
exceptions, this exception must be accepted ... and it must be
verified that this is the only way to save life. This must be
demonstrated," Sgreccia said.


      In the 1960s, the Vatican itself condoned giving contraceptive
pills to nuns at risk of rape by fighters in the Congo to prevent
pregnancy, arguing that the contraception was a lesser evil than
pregnancy.


      Archbishop Gregory Aymond of New Orleans said clearly the pope
wasn't encouraging condom use.


      "I think the pope has been very strong in saying condoms do not
solve the problem of morality and do not solve the problem of good
sex education. But if a person chooses not to follow the teaching
of Christ in the church, they are at least obliged to prevent
another person from contracting a disease that is deadly," he
said.
      In Africa, Benedict's comments drew praise among gays and AIDS
activists.


      "If he's talking about condoms, it's a step in the right
direction," said David Kamau, who heads the nonprofit Kenya
Treatment Access Movement. "It's accepting the reality on the
ground ... If the Church has failed to get people to follow its
moral values and practice abstinence, they should take the next
best step and encourage condom use."


      John Kitte, a gay Ugandan, said the pope was acting as a good
parent.


      "He minds about all the people living on earth. What he has
suggested is very good and I encourage gays to take his advice
seriously."
      But an evangelist pastor in the Uganda capital of Kampala,
Solomon Male, argued the pope shouldn't be granting any recognition
of or encouragement to gays.


      "If the Pope is saying so, then he has not read the Bible," he
said. "Gay acts are bad. It is abominable and should not take
place."


      Christian Weisner, of the pro-reform group We Are Church in the
pope's native Germany, said the pope's comments were "surprising,
and if that's the case one can be happy about the pope's ability to
learn."


      In other comments in the book, Benedict said:


      - If a pope is no longer physically, psychologically or
spiritually capable of doing his job, then he has the "right, and
under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign."
      -He was surprised by the scale of clerical sex abuse,
particularly in his native Germany, and acknowledged that the
Vatican could have better communicated its response. "One can
always wonder whether the pope should not speak more often."


      - On Islam in Europe, he declined to endorse such moves as
France's banning the burqa or Switzerland's citizen referendum to
forbid topping mosques with minarets.


      "Christians are tolerant, and in that respect they also allow
others to have their self-image," Benedict replied when asked if
Christians should be "glad" about such initiatives. "As for the
burqa, I can see no reason for a general ban."


      - On Pope Pius XII, the wartime pontiff accused by some Jewish
groups of staying publicly silent on the Holocaust: Some historians
have asked the Vatican to put Pius' sainthood process on hold until
the Holy See opens up its archives from his papacy. But Benedict
said an internal "inspection" of those unpublished documents
failed to support "negative" allegations against Pius.

      "It is perfectly clear that as soon as he protested publicly,
the Germans would have ceased to respect" Vatican
extraterritoriality of convents and monasteries who were sheltering
Jews from the Nazi occupiers in Rome. "The thousands who had found
a safe haven ... would have been surely deported," Benedict
argued.


      In the book, Benedict also offers insights into his private
life, saying he enjoys watching TV at home in the evenings with his
secretaries and the four women who take care of his apartment,
preferring the news and an Italian TV show from decades ago "Don
Camillo and Peppone" about a parish priest and his bumbling
assistant.
      He said he always wears his white cassock, never a sweater, and
wears an old Junghans watch that was left to him by his sister when
she died. When he prays, he said, he prays to the Lord as well as
the saints and considers himself good friends with Sts. Augustine,
Bonaventure and Thomas Aquinas.


      In the book, he comes across as open, charming and funny - and
deeply concerned about his church, its people and their future.


      He reflects on the legacy of the landmark 1968 encyclical,
"Humanae vitae," where Pope Paul VI laid out the church's
opposition to artificial contraception. Decades later, "the basic
lines of `Humanae vitae' are still correct."
      Still, the pope said, sexual ethics today pose a huge question.
"It is correct there is much in this area that needs to be
pondered and expressed in new ways."
      He championed the church's advocacy of the so-called "rhythm
method," by which a married couple who don't want to conceive
avoid intercourse on days when the woman is likely to be fertile,
saying that is "not just a method but a way of life."


      "And that is something fundamentally different from when I take
the pill without binding myself interiorly to another person, so
that I can jump into bed with a random acquaintance," Benedict
said.

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Pope Benedict XVI says in a new book that
condoms can be justified for male prostitutes seeking to stop HIV,
a stunning turnaround for a church that has long opposed condoms
and a pontiff who has blamed them for making the AIDS crisis worse.

Pope: condoms can be justified in some cases

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