Papal Bull

A Papal Bull is a formal letter or decree written by the pope and sealed with a device called a Bulla. These papal missives have been disseminated this way for centuries, beginning in the sixth CE. The name Papal Bull, however, did not come into use officially until the fifteenth century.

I won't be discussing that type of Papal Bull today.

When Karol Wojtila became Pope John Paul II on October 16, 1978, he was widely regarded as the pope who would reform the Catholic church and finally bring some modernity to its ancient superstitions. It is widely accepted that he largely helped to end the rule of the communist party in his home country of Poland. Lech Walesa and Solidarity have contributed more significantly in my opinion, but church leaders will embellish whatever they think will aggrandize their particular version of Christianity.

His contribution to the Church included a general rapprochement with Judaism, a reduction in the requirements of beatification and sainthood, doing away with the office of advocatus diaboli, devil's advocate, and reducing the number of required "miracles" for sainthood to just two. The strict requirement for these miracles to be proven has also been softened so that now just about anyone can be canonised, even John Paul himself. 
John Paul II also further entrenched his church in the workings of human sexuality and sexual politics, strengthening its position against homosexuality, abortion and contraception.

The pope's views on contraception in particular has resulted in millions of unwanted children being born as a result of the failure of the church condoned "Catholic Roulette", or the rhythm method of contraception. The amount of misery, disease and crime that this practice has caused may never fully be understood.

Further to his inappropriate, in my view, attention to matters of sexuality, was his blanket injunction against the use of condoms, even within marriage. This insistence on abstinence as the solution to the spread of AIDS in Africa and South America is responsible for the deaths of millions during John Paul II's reign and is the main reason that I, and many other liberals condemn his memory.

That his acts in this regard are despicable is one thing, but his successor, Joseph Ratzinger, has compounded the problem further by making this statement on a trip to Cameroon in March 2009, "(AIDS is) a tragedy that cannot be overcome by money alone, that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems."

Aggravates, one might think, is Vatican-speak for "makes better".