VATICAN CITY, Nov 24, (Agencies): Pope Benedict XVI sought to “kick-start a debate” when he said some condom use may be justified, Vatican insiders say, raising hopes the church may be starting to back away from its complete ban and allow condoms to play a role in the battle against AIDS.

Just a year after he said condoms could be making the AIDS crisis worse, Benedict said that for some people, such as male prostitutes, using them could represent a first step in assuming moral responsibility to “reduce the risk of infection.”

The pope did not suggest using condoms as birth control, which is banned by the church, or mention female prostitutes or the use of condoms by married couples where one partner is infected.

Still, some saw the pope’s comments as an attempt to move the church forward on the issue of condoms and health risks.

For years divisions in the Vatican have held up any effort to reconcile the church’s ban on contraception with the need to help halt the spread of AIDS. Theologians have studied the possibility of condoning limited condom use as a lesser evil, and reports years ago said the Vatican was considering a document on the issue, though opposition apparently blocked publication.

One senior Vatican official has said he believed the pope just “wanted to kick-start the debate.” He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

For the deeply conservative Benedict, it seemed like a bold leap into modernity — and the worst nightmare of many at the Vatican. The pope’s comments set off a firestorm among Catholics, politicians and health workers that is certain to reverberate for a long time despite frantic damage control at the Vatican.

In a sign of the tensions, the Holy See’s chief spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, rushed out a statement to counter any impression the church might lift its ban on artificial birth control. Lombardi stressed the pope’s comment neither “reforms nor changes” church teaching.

While much of the world hailed Benedict’s statement as a major shift toward lifting the church ban on condoms, conservatives insisted the pontiff was not “justifying” condom use from a theological point of view.

Many Vatican observers were struck by the example the pope used — that of a male prostitute — though the comments clearly were not meant to condone prostitution or homosexual conduct, which the church condemns as “intrinsically disordered.”

And while Benedict made only a tiny opening, he stepped where no pope has gone since Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical “Humanae Vitae,” which was supposed to have closed debate on church policy barring Roman Catholics from using condoms and other artificial contraception.

Also on the panel is an influential prelate who showed his independence last year when he argued that Brazilian doctors should not be excommunicated for aborting the twin fetuses of a 9-year-old child allegedly raped by her stepfather. Monsignor Rino Fisichella argued the doctors were saving the girl’s life and should be shown mercy — but he was forced out as head of the Vatican’s bioethics advisory committee for his stance.

The conservative Benedict previously had shown little sign of budging on the issue of condoms. Last year while en route to Africa, the continent hardest hit by HIV, he drew criticism from many health workers by saying condoms not only did not help stop the spread of AIDS but exacerbated the problem.

With Benedict prone to gaffes and crises — such as his remarks likening Islam to violence that caused a fury in the Muslin world and his lifting of the excommunication of a Holocaust-denier — some wondered whether it was again a communication problem.

However, Peter Seewald wrote in the preface that Benedict had reviewed the text and made only small corrections. Seewald, who wrote two other books of interviews with Benedict while he was a cardinal, spent six hours over six days with Benedict at the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo in July.

Book: The author of a controversial new book in which Pope Benedict XVI says for the first time he approves of condom use to reduce the risk of disease presented his volume in the Vatican recently.

In the book, which is expected to go on sale in at least 18 languages, the pope also said he could retire if his health worsens and spoke of his torment over the flood of reported cases of child abuse by clergymen.

The volume, entitled “Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times,” is based on 20 hours of interviews with the 83-year-old pontiff conducted by German journalist Peter Seewald, a Catholic convert.

“In this case or that case, there can be... in the intention of reducing the risk of infection, a first step in a movement toward a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality,” Benedict is quoted as saying in the book.

The pope gave the example of a male prostitute but his spokesman, Federico Lombardi, said it could apply to male, female or transsexual prostitutes.

“The message is that a grave risk to the life of another person should be avoided. It should be a first step towards responsibility,” Lombardi said.

The Vatican has traditionally prohibited the use of any form of contraception and the pope’s comments have unleashed a wave of comment across the Catholic world, as well as getting approval from AIDS campaigners.

Lombardi said the pope had raised the issue because “he believes the question is important today,” while Seewald said he thought media attention on condoms was “ridiculous” given the significance of other subjects discussed.

The book addresses a number of other highly sensitive issues, including the paedophile clergy scandals in Europe and the US that have plunged the church into its worst crisis in many years and have clouded Benedict’s pontificate.

The pope said the scale of abuse by clergymen was an “unprecedented shock” for him and he likened the crisis to “a volcano out of which suddenly a tremendous cloud of filth came, darkening and soiling everything.

The clarification was necessary because the German, English and French versions of the book used the male article when referring to a prostitute but the Italian version used the female article.

Lombardi said he asked the pope directly about it to clarify his thinking.

“I asked the pope personally if there was a serious distinction in the choice of male instead of female and he said ‘no’,” Lombardi said.

“That is, the point is it (the use of a condom) should be a first step towards responsibility in being aware of the risk of the life of the other person one has relations with,” Lombardi said.

“If it is a man, a woman or a transsexual who does it, we are always at the same point, which is the first step in responsibly avoiding passing on a grave risk to the other.”