VATICAN CITY — The Vatican yesterday sought to clarify the pope’s controversial comments about condoms and HIV, saying he by no means suggested condom use could be condoned as a means of avoiding pregnancy.

The Vatican’s moral watchdog, the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, issued a statement saying some commentators had misunderstood and misrepresented the pope’s remarks in a book-length interview released last month titled “Light of the World.’’

The Vatican has been under pressure from conservative theologians to issue such a clarification amid widespread confusion about what Pope Benedict XVI meant and whether he was breaking with church teaching.

In the book, Benedict said that condoms were not the real or moral solution to battling HIV and AIDS. But he said that condom use in some cases, such as for male prostitutes, could be a first step toward a more moral and responsible human sexuality.

The Vatican statement reaffirmed that the church considered prostitution gravely immoral.

“However, those involved in prostitution who are HIV positive and who seek to diminish the risk of contagion by the use of a condom may be taking the first step in respecting the life of another even if the evil of prostitution remains in all its gravity,’’ the statement said.

It insisted that Benedict’s statement was “in full conformity with the moral theological tradition of the church.’’

The pope’s remarks have been mired in confusion since they were published in the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano Nov. 20.

Moral theologians have filled blogs and religious publications with interpretations and counter-interpretations, with many questioning whether the pontiff should have even broached the issue in such a casual way, given the nuance of his message and the risk that it would be misinterpreted.

Matters were not helped when the official Italian translation of the original German published in L’Osservatore made two translation errors: It used the word “justified’’ in the pope’s remarks and also used the feminine version of “prostitute’’ as opposed to the pope’s original masculine — an important distinction given that condoms in heterosexual intercourse are a form of artificial contraception, which the church opposes.

In the new statement, printed in full in L’Osservatore, the Vatican stressed that Benedict was not talking about sex between husband and wife or condom use as a form of contraception.

“The idea that anyone could deduce from the words of Benedict XVI that it is somehow legitimate, in certain situations, to use condoms to avoid an unwanted pregnancy is completely arbitrary and is in no way justified either by his words or in his thought,’’ the statement said.

Reports of the pope’s comments had been greeted with relief among AIDS activists and even among some church personnel working on the front lines in Africa, where UNAIDS estimates that 22.4 million people are infected with HIV.

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