More Clarification on Pope Condom Remarks

The Vatican issued another clarification Tuesday on recent remarks from Pope Benedict XVI that condoms could be used for disease prevention, pushing back against those who would interpret his comments as a green light for contraception.

According to The New York Times, the new statement came from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the most powerful Vatican office, which suggests the degree to which the Pope's remarks have caused confusion and dissension within the Church.

"The Vatican's new statement said that Benedict's comments had been misinterpreted and manipulated by those who effectively saw them as permission for more widespread use of condoms, which like all birth control goes against church teaching," reported the Times.

In a book of interviews with a German journalist published last month, Benedict said that condoms might be used as "a first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption of responsibility." He offered the example of a male prostitute using a condom to prevent the spread of disease.

The Italian translation of the interview used the feminine form for prostitute, which created confusion. However, the Vatican has struggled to make clear that the overriding issue is disease prevention, regardless of gender, and that condoms may not be used to prevent pregnancy.