How Long Has the Pope Been An Aid-Worker in Africa?

NPR-Chicago/BBC World News and Riazut Butt of The Guardian send me news that makes me sick:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/17/pope-africa-condoms-aids

While it makes me physically queasy that they include a hazy, so-opinionated (like assholes, sure, everyone's got a slanted photograph)anti-Pope looking photograph of Pope Benedict XVI, I can't help but feel anything other than sheer anger and frustration (albeit, far away, foreign blogstration)at the Pope's comments on condoms for HIV protection measures:

"The pontiff, speaking to journalists on his flight, said the condition was 'a tragedy that cannot be overcome by money alone, that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems.'"

I hate how dialectic namby-pamby, high school debate-speak is ruling this argument. I don't expect the Pope to come out all for condoms and other birth-control reducing means of self-safety, but Christ. I feel like Christ and the apostles (if you believe in them simply as historical figures) would be impressed by the efforts of foreign aid workers and their attempts at treatment, prevention and the like.

Listening on NPR, some tactful BBC lady asked Vatican officials how they might deal with a situation where a husband or wife might have the AIDs Virus, while the other one remained uninfected. Here the official said that the Catholic church is realistic and understanding and would consider the issue a special matter in the use of condoms...

However, who is there is dole out this information to couples in this situation? Without proper knowledge (and somehow I doubt the safe travel of periodicals and letters in some areas of gang-ruled African countries) these people could be dead on their feet, or at least infected, with the Catholic church all but banning condoms where and when they can. With this hypothetical situation, where would the condoms for this couple be found in a theocratically-tinged area?

UGH. Where is this going? I wish I could wrap my journalistic tentacles around this Pope. Without charged photographs.