Another thing, AIDS aside, condoms were originally intended for the prevention of unwanted pregnancies. Many couples can’t even afford to have children or have more children. Why bring untold unnecessary babies into this world, especially in emerging nations where there is dire poverty, Dafur comes to mind? Yet, you support this pope who believes that nobody should be using artificial birth control, no matter their economic situation or poverty level. Yes, condoms are not 100% effective, but without them, we’ll see an ever increasing number of new infections occuring. Abstinence is a solution I agree, but in reality its not going to happen on a global scale, especially in developing countries.

One other thing, many of the HIV infections on the African continent are often heterosexually transmitted, in fact the majority of them are and many of them spread by married males, not just single men. So that alone debunks the myth that marriage rules out condom use and that only single men are promiscuous. Your David Vitter comes to mind, Newt Gingrich, Henry Hyde, Jack Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, Eliot Spitzer, Vito Fossella, and many more. Get it? I guess not.

What makes you come to a gay website anyway? Prurient interest or is it because you just can’t stay away from men?

I agree with you in only one point: the pope is not really being skeptical of science. This is because he is fully aware (how can anyone not be?) that statistically condoms do prevent the spread of HIV for people who are engaging in marriage without being married. However, the pope is, as other posters have pointed out, living in a fantasy world thinking that everyone will remain celibate before marriage. Indeed, I would argue that his his insistance that others live a life of celibacy before marriage is naive and foolish. For the vast majority of people who are engaging in sex, condoms are a safer alternative that will drastically reduce the spread of HIV. This is where the pope was very wrong- he chose his words very poorly, muddling the distinction between his beliefs and the scientific facts on the issue. The pope has the right to believe whatever he wishes, and to preach those beliefs to his congregation, but he has a moral duty not to confuse the issue in such a way that is dangerous to the lives of others.

You aren’t “living in the real world”, Falk.
In the real world, people are having sex outside of man/woman marriage all the time.

And if gays can’t get married, they “aren’t going to put their lives on ice forever”. That is not how the “real world” operates, Get it, Falk?

If you aren’t willing to give marriage to gays since sex in marriage is what you believe in but only to straights, then don’t blame gays for “falling through the marriage cracks” and having sex outside of marriage, few are willing to be celebate and if gays commit to someone special in their lives then love and sex happens.

To stop love is like trying to stop the ocean tide. Get it, Falk?

If marriage comes to Maryland, I will embrace it, but if it doesn’t I will have sex within the parameters of one very special man I come to love, But I “am not putting my life on ice forever” nor am I marrying a woman I don’t want just to suit your unrealistic man/woman only model. Realistic for you, Falk, but not realistic for me as a gay man.

You have no choice, you don’t want men. I have no choice, because I don’t want women and I have a limited patience for loud, screaming kids. So, I will use a condom each and every time and will love my future man true.

Pope doesn’t get it and neither do you.

I have gay male friends in long-term monogamous relationships with the same man in some cases up to 25 years. My lesbian cousin was in a committed and loving relationship with another woman for 33 plus years. longer than many straight marriages, Falk. These people were in successful very long-term same-sex relationships with one and only one person. If that is not monogamous to one person only then what is it??

Sorry if this doesn’t “square” with your heterosexist and hetero-only-centered point of view.

My being a gay Christian doesn’t stop me from believing in condom use, in evolution, in sound and current science, in every day down to earth common sense. I do not follow any living leader of faith, I only follow ethics, standards, right from wrong, having a conscience, having within reason a good and clean heart and in following only the God that lives within my mind, my heart, my spirit. Neither Pope nor Anglican Archbishop will I follow, only God as far as I can.

And most of the time condoms do protect. Lack of condoms NEVER PROTECT ANY PERCENTAGE OF THE TIME.

There is no guarantee that the woman a straight man is going to marry isn’t virus free either, Falk, and only testing which is getting better and better, can reveal that.

Do you help feed the hungry or give clothes to those in need of them (Katrina or the homeless, etc)or do you merely oppress people who don’t share your gender preference in whom to love?