THE Pope's visit to Sydney is also shaping up as an ideological clash of rival family planning methods. Anti-Pope demonstrators plan to hand out condoms to Catholic pilgrims during Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Sydney next week for World Youth Day.
The condom campaign is in protest against the Vatican's opposition to artificial contraception.
However, Catholics say they are determined the condom campaigners won't have it all their own way.
The Australian Council of Natural Family Planning (ACNFP) says it will give pilgrims its own material promoting the sympto-thermal method (STM) of natural family planning.
The ACNFP, a Catholic church-based organisation, said every previous World Youth Day gathering had been marked by protests about the church's teachings on sexuality and contraception.
"Interestingly, despite the thousands of young people there to celebrate their belief in the church, it is the condom peddlers who tend to catch the eye of the media,'' it said.
"But this time we're ready for them!
"Despite popular belief, the church isn't against sexuality. On the contrary, the church wants everyone to develop a deeper, richer understanding of the meaning of sex and sexuality,'' the ACNFP said.
ACNFP president Brian Maher said the group would hand out material on "natural family planning'' to pilgrims before next week's final WYD mass at Randwick in Sydney.
The sympto-thermal method (STM) involves using the knowledge of the naturally-occurring fertile and infertile phases of a woman's menstrual cycle.+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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