Well, I followed your link, here is part of what it says:

The Pope said "the traditional teaching of the Church has proven to be the only failsafe way to prevent the spread of HIV/Aids".

The BBC's David Willey in Rome says the Church's view is that encouraging people to use condoms only minimises the effects of behaviour that in itself damages lives.

The pope is absolutely right, and David Wiley is absolutely right in correctly stating the Catholic Church's position (something that the BBC is often not very good at).

Condoms can fail, through physical defects or, more often, improper use. Moral sexual behavior, by definition, cannot.

The report then goes on:

But the London-based Lancet said the Pope had "publicly distorted scientific evidence to promote Catholic doctrine on this issue".

It said the male latex condom was the single most efficient way to reduce the sexual transmission of HIV/Aids.

"Whether the Pope's error was due to ignorance or a deliberate attempt to manipulate science to support Catholic ideology is unclear," said the journal.

But it said the comment still stood and urged the Vatican to issue a retraction.

"When any influential person, be it a religious or political figure, makes a false scientific statement that could be devastating to the health of millions of people, they should retract or correct the public record," it said.

Outrageous! There wasn't any distortion and there wasn't any error, and there certainly isn't anything to retract.

The pope can no more say, "If you're going to commit adultery be sure to use a condom" than he can say, "If you're going to rob a bank be sure to post a lookout."

With the remainder of your post I take very little exception.