Catholics Decry Condom Initiative

A day after the city unveiled its New York-branded condoms, two prominent Catholic leaders called the health department's free condom initiative "tragic and misguided."

In a joint statement, Edward Cardinal Egan and Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio spoke out against the city's decision to distribute 18 million free condoms a year to local health clinics, non-profit organizations, and businesses.

Since June 2005, the health has made free condoms available on its Web site. The city-sponsored condoms will now come in plastic wrappers that read "NYC Condom," and feature a subway station motif, the health commissioner announced Wednesday.

"Our political leaders fail to protect the moral tone of our community when they encourage inappropriate sexual activity by blanketing our neighborhoods with condoms," Cardinal Egan and Bishop DiMarzio's statement read. "Although in their statements they give nod to the truth that only abstinence before marriage and fidelity within marriage are failsafe, by their actions they ignore that truth and degrade societal standards."

The cardinal and the bishop criticized the city for using taxpayer dollars to purchase and distribute condoms — thereby promoting "the attitude that ‘anything goes'" according to the statement.