While Critics Blame Catholic Church for AIDSDeaths Stats Show Just the Opposite

Church's accusers have not done the homework or aredeliberately misreporting the facts

By Hilary White

LONDON,March 5, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Catholic Church is killing"millions" because of its teaching on chastity and fidelity inmarriage and needs to change its "policy" on banning condoms in thefight against HIV/AIDS, according to a popular and apparently perpetual themein mainstream journalism.

Commentators, especially from Britain, regularly pronouncethat the late Pope John Paul II, and his successor Benedict XVI, are personallyresponsible for the deaths of millions of people because of their opposition tocontraception, particularly condoms.

TheGuardian's Polly Toynbee, on the occasion of the death of John Paul II, calledthe Vatican, "a modern, potent force for cruelty and hypocrisy."Toynbee said with the "ban on condoms the church has caused the death ofmillions of Catholics and others in areas dominated by Catholic missionaries,in Africa and right across the world. In countries where 50% are infected,millions of very young Aids orphans are today's immediate victims of the curia."

Catholicreaders of the mainstream press are familiar with the regular appearance ofarticles speculating on whether the Pope will "lift the ban" orapprove the use of condoms to stop AIDS.

Last weekthe Times' religion correspondent, Ruth Gledhill, wrote on her weblog that sheand Times colleague Richard Owen in Rome, were "inundated" withemails, calls "and other tips" wondering if the Pope intended to liftthe "ban" on condoms in his Ash Wednesday homily that afternoon.

The rumourwas entirely false, she said, but it was followed the next day with a letterspeculating that Pope Benedict would lift the ban on the occasion of the 20thanniversary of the publication of Donum Vitae, a document that reiterated theCatholic teaching on the sinfulness of artificial contraception, includingbarrier methods.

Gledhillquoted John Coventry of the aid organization, ActionAid, that promotes condomuse for AIDS prevention. Translating Catholic teaching on chastity and fidelityin marriage as "anti-condom ideology" Coventry said it "has gotin the way of pragmatic approaches to preventing the spread of thedisease."

"Forthe Pope to relax Catholic attitudes to condoms would send a clear signal thatit is not acceptable to prevent access to potentially life saving materials -in this case condoms - on grounds of religious belief," Coventry said.

Coventry'scomments were mild compared to Toynbee in 2005 when she compared John Paul IIto Vladimir Lenin: "they both put extreme ideology before human life and happiness,at unimaginable human cost."

Toynbeewrote, "Disgracefully, the European rich quietly ignore the church'soutlandish teachings on contraception without rebelling on behalf of thehelpless third-world poor who die for their misplaced faith. Those 'civilised'Catholics have as much blood on their hands as the Vatican they support."

A shortexamination, however, of the HIV/AIDS rates of those African countries thathave a large Catholic population shows that the Church's accusers have not donethe homework or are deliberately misreporting the facts. The availablestatistics show that countries with a large Catholic percentage population,show significantly lower rates of HIV/AIDS infections than countries withmostly non-Catholic populations.

2003statistics from the World Factbook of the US Central Intelligence Agency, showsBurundi at 62% Catholic with 6% AIDS infection rate. Angola's population is 38%Roman Catholic and has 3.9% AIDS rate. Ghana is 63% Christian, with in someregions as much as 33% Catholic and has 3.1% AIDS rate. Nigeria, divided almostevenly between the strongly Muslim north and Christian and "animist"south, has 5.4% AIDS rate.

StronglyChristian Uganda continues to frustrate condom-pushing NGO's by maintaining itsabstinence and fidelity AIDS prevention programs and one of the lowest rates ofAIDS in Africa, at 4.1%. Uganda's population is listed by the CIA Factbook as33% Roman Catholic and 33% Protestant.

Of Africancountries with low Catholic populations, Botswana is typical with 37.3% AIDS,one of the highest in Africa, and 5% of the total population Catholic. In 2003,Swaziland was shown to have a 38.8% AIDS infection rate and only 20% Catholicpopulation.

Readrelated LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Uganda AIDSPrevention Success Being Undermined by Infuriated UN Condom-Pushers

http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/feb/05020408.html