The nation’s Roman Catholic bishops have set the stage for a possible revision of a controversial statement giving qualified support for AIDS-education programs that cite the use of condoms as a means of preventing the spread of the disease.
The 50-member administrative board of the United States Catholic Conference, which issued the pastoral statement on acquired immune deficiency syndrome in December, has decided to put the document on the agenda of a June meeting of all 300 bishops.
At a three-day meeting in Washington late last month, the board called for “full discussion’’ of AIDS in a closed-door session when the bishops meet in Collegeville, Minn.
The 30-page policy statement, written by a committee of four bishops, was criticized by several prelates, who said it would cause confusion about the church’s traditional stance against artificial methods of contraception. (See Education Week, Jan. 13, 1988.)
