Pope Attacks ‘Contraceptive Imperialism’

Pope John Paul II visited the multi-ethnic, French-administered island of Reunion on Monday after ending the first leg of his African tour with a fierce attack against “contraceptive imperialism” and “the search for immediate pleasure.”

French Premier Michel Rocard, a Protestant, met the white-robed pontiff together with thousands of the faithful as he stepped off an Air Madagascar jetliner and kissed the ground at the Indian Ocean island’s Gillot Airport.

A chorus representing the island’s African, Malagasy, Indian, Chinese and European ethnicities sang the popular local song, “It Smells Like Banana, Vanilla and Cumin,” which tells of celebrating Christmas during the summer on the island, which lies in the Southern Hemisphere.

Reunion, the most remote of France’s overseas territories, remains a stronghold of the Roman Catholic Church, with 94% of the island’s 500,000 residents baptized into the faith.

John Paul flew to Reunion after concluding a four-day trip to the island of Madagascar, 600 miles away, by reiterating his strong opposition to any form of artificial birth control.

“The teaching of the church appears difficult,” the pontiff conceded in a homily during a solemn open-air Mass he celebrated at the southern Malagasy city of Fianarantsoa. “But many couples bear witness that it is possible to follow it, and that it is even a liberation compared with what is called ‘contraceptive imperialism,’ which so often is to the detriment of the woman,” he said.

The Pope warned that “the search for immediate pleasure counts for more to certain people than the more truly human value of giving oneself to one’s partner for the whole of life.”