The Pope isn't interested in promoting "lesser evils." The Church thinks any sex act that does not imply some openness to procreation is wrong, wrong, wrong. Even if you're married. Even if you are HIV+. All that is just too bad for you. How hard can a sexless life be in comparison with eternal damnation? The Church isn't going anywhere near the contraceptive mudslide until it's time to go all the way to the bottom. If the Pope says something different, I'll eat my hat.

As a self avowed "a la carte Catholic" I gotta say, it's about freaking time! The church's sexual theology is so misguided as to be laughable.

Although I do find it funny how the anti-papists (sorry, I couldn't help it, I love those old-timey slurs ;) always harp on the condom thing. I think we can all agree that the overwhelming majority of AIDS transmissions occurs outside the confines of marriage right? Well if you're having sex outside of marriage then you're already commiting a mortal sin (myself included, not just them heathens). I find it hard to believe that there's a slew of adulterers thinking "well even though I'm committing a sin, I better not double up on the sinning by also wearing a condom!"

I guess what I mean is that nobody who's having sex outside of marriage is thinking of the religious implications when they decide not to use a condom. The church's ban on condoms is a minor issue regarding AIDS prevention...sure it's important that they change, but don't think that overnight the contraction of AIDS will disappear in developing nations once it does.

I find it hard to believe that there's a slew of adulterers thinking "well even though I'm committing a sin, I better not double up on the sinning by also wearing a condom!"

That's a straw man. The problem is when your society is so dominated by ignorant Catholics that you can't even buy condoms to protect yourself because they're either not available or our of fear of ostracism.

You know, as a Catholic, I have never understood the tizzy the world gets into about our beliefs.

Let me see if I can explain this to you.

The Church has very deep and complex beliefs on pretty much everything. To say the Church views condom use, masturbation, homosexuality, or abortion as a sin, misses a much larger point. Although these things are sins, so is gluttony, drunkenness, missing mass on a holy day of obligation, taking the Lord's name in vain, or having lust in one's heart. We are all sinners, that is the nature of man, gay people, unmarried sexually active people, & those who fail to devote the required amount of time to God during the week are all equal as sinners in the eyes of God. It is man who calls for levels of sins, and allowable sins, to God all sins are equal, and all sins are forgivable.

Are words like abomination and evil bandied about in these conversations, yes, but that is because there is a movement from many who sin to have their sins declared no longer sins. No man is without sin, and it is hubris of people to ask to have their sins expunged just because their sins are popular.

At every mass every Catholic, the Pope included, asks for forgiveness for their sins before approaching the alter. That is the Catholic relationship to sin, not one of judgment, but one of constant effort to overcome it.

That being said, it is accepted in the church that one's actions may be sinful but not a sin. To kill in self defense is not a sin, though surely the killing is. Likewise, although various acts may be deemed sinful in the abstract, the Catholic Church does understand that one may find a path within the sin where no sin occurs. This is not a question of sin accounting, but of your own personal relationship with God. Sex is not a sin, because it bonds two people in love and has the possibility of creating life. In situations where there is no love, and no life to be created, the act is one of pure hedonism. It is self-aggrandizement and self-gratification, and that does not bring you closer to god. That which does not bring you closer to God is a sin because man is only not sinful when he seeks out God. The Church makes blanket statements on sin only because people demand it. If you ask yourself, with your action do you bring yourself closer to God or farther away? As you know the answer you know if it is a sin.

Now perhaps you do not believe in sin, or believe that pleasure for its own sake is no sin at all. In which case I must ask, why do you care about the opinions of the Pope? Why is an old celibate man's thoughts on your sex life a thing you are concerned with? Is it just that he is on the world stage? Surely there are equal men on the world stage who advocate opinions that you do agree with, why do you concern yourself with opinions of those who disagree with you?

The Church dances on this issue, just as it dances on homosexuality. You know if what you do is sinful, clearly infecting someone else with a deadly disease is sinful, just as anonymous sex in a bathhouse is sinful. But if you are with someone you love, and your actions show that love, and bring you both closer to God you do not need the Pope to tell you your actions are pure.

The lists of sins are for handy reference and for accountants, and have as much to do with the faith of Catholicism and the salvation of God as does the price of tea in China. If knowing these rules and rituals bring you closer to God and help you stay on the Path of God then they serve their purpose. If they cause you to sin by way of sanctioning your behavior by illuminating a perceived loophole, then better that you be rid of them.

"If your hand offends thee", Jesus said, and in that you can understand what these Papal decrees truly mean to the practice of faith. Your hand does not lead you to sin, but your heart, and if you use the words of the Pope to sanction your hatred of others, or your immoral behavior then it is best you look deeper into your own actions and purposes. Do you wish to give glory to God in your actions, or simply to give yourself a moment of joy?

We all wish to feel that joy, to have that physical moment of pleasure. We all sin, and all sinners, you, me, and the Pope are all welcome to stand before God acknowledge their own weakness, and approach the Lord.

Don't look for sex advice from the Pope, that's why God gave us Cary Tennis.