CAFOD is the international development agency of the conference of the Roman Catholic Bishops of England & Wales.  There has been concern about CAFOD's policy on contraception for many years and such concerns were confirmed as justified in the year 2000 when a UK Catholic newspaper, The Universe, published an article about CAFOD's stance on condoms entitled: Aids needs a 'rethink'.

Many complaints were made at the time and have continued to be raised both with CAFOD itself and with the Bishops.  CAFOD and the Bishops continue to claim that CAFOD's policy, which supports condom use, is in keeping with the teaching of the Catholic Church - which it is not.

On September 25, 2004, another Catholic publication, The Tablet, published an article entitled: Where CAFOD stands.  In this article by Ann Smith who is CAFOD's director of HIV, it explicitly declares support for an ABC - abstain, be faithful, use a condom - approach to HIV prevention.

The Tablet article was a shortened version of CAFOD's presentation of its HIV policy at the 15th International Conference on AIDS, Bangkok, July 2004.  CAFOD's HIV policy document can be downloaded in PDF format from their website by clicking here.  We believe that CAFOD's HIV policy document violates the Catechism of the Catholic Church and a number of other documents of church teaching called encyclicals.  For those who are interested, just one example is page 6 of the document that is concerned with behaviour change in which CAFOD question 'fixed notions of good and bad'.

You can read our letters to the Bishops and to the press, plus articles and replies we have received from our correspondence.

In 2004 the Roman Catholic Bishops of England & Wales launched 'Listening 2004' which is a consultation of the laity on marriage and family life.  United for Life published 'Our bodies are not our own' as our response to this in which we have a chapter on CAFOD listing them as one of the organisations threatening marriage and family life by their policy of promoting condoms.

CAFOD and Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor received a condom award for their promotion of condoms by Catholics for a free Choice.

Direct Link to Rubber World the leading magazine for the rubber industry
Once on Rubber World site click on 'Articles/Archives' then scroll to month 'June' & year '1993' for CM Roland's article entitled : The barrier performance of latex rubber.

Take Action - Write to:

CAFOD Executive Director and the CAFOD Chairman at www.cafod.org.uk or e-mail them at: cafod@cafod.org.uk

Catholic Bishops Conference at www.catholic-ew.org.uk