Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2000. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Reuters NewMedia - Thursday November 30, 2000
Philip Pullella

Vatican officials also told a news conference that while it was no secret some priests had contracted AIDS either through sexual conduct or contact with AIDS patients, they felt media attention on the issue was "morbid curiosity."

"Is it possible to use condoms? Of course. Many people use them. But if you ask whether they are allowed according to Catholic doctrine, the answer is 'no' because they are not ethically permissible," said Archbishop Javier Barragan.

Barragan, president of the Pontifical Council for Health Workers, was speaking on the opening of a two-day symposium at the Vatican on AIDS and health care.

The Roman Catholic Church has come under fire from international population and health organizations in recent years over its teachings against the use of condoms.

The Church teaches that artificially blocking the possible transmission of life is not moral and that only monogamous heterosexual relations within marriage are permissible.

"We are opposed to the use of condoms because they do not respect the absolute dignity of the human person," Barragan said.

Rumors have swept Church circles around the world that the Vatican might be on the verge of allowing limited use of condoms based on the concept of the "lesser of two evils."

The speculation was fuelled by an article last September in "America," the authoritative journal of the U.S. Jesuits.

America had interpreted a complex article in the Vatican's newspaper as signaling that there had been a subtle but significant change in the Roman Catholic stand on condoms.

Officials at Thursday's news conference said the article in the Vatican newspaper had been misinterpreted by America.

"From the physical point of view, condoms are certainly a lesser evil. From the moral point of view they are not a lesser evil and are absolutely not legitimate," said Father Bonifacio Honings, a Dutch moral theologian who advises the Vatican.

Criticism Of Church Rejected

Officials at the news conference rejected criticism of the Church by some organizations over its stand on condoms.

"For too many years now, we have been hearing criticism of the Church because it opposes the use of condoms," said Father Felice Ruffini, undersecretary of the Vatican department hosting the AIDS conference for health workers.

"The laws of Christ are difficult to accept and there is compassion and understanding for those who are weak, but no exceptions to moral laws can be made," he said. Barragan said the Catholic Church is directly or indirectly involved around the world in 25 percent of the work to help victims of AIDS and to stem the spread of the disease.

Both Barragan and Ruffini said no one in the Church was trying to hide the fact that some priests had caught AIDS, either by succumbing to sexual temptation or by working with terminally ill AIDS patients, particularly in the Third World.

"What they do is wrong but they are only human," Ruffini said of priests who have been infected through sexual activity.

Catholic priests take vows of chastity for life.

According to Church officials, the number of priests with HIV or AIDS in Italy is much lower than in some developed countries, particularly the United States.
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