In his book Jesus of Nazareth, Joseph Ratzinger writes: "The aid offered by the West to developing countries has been purely technically and materially based, and not only has it left God out of the picture, but has driven men away from God. And this aid, proudly claiming to 'know better,' is itself what first turned the 'third world' into what we mean today by that term. It has thrust aside indigenous, religious, ethical and social structures and filled the resulting vacuum with its technocratic mind-set. The idea was that we could turn stones into bread; instead, our 'aid' has only given stones instead of bread" (p. 33).

Some western political leaders, as reported in The Times (March 20), are now questioning the Pope's ability to run the Church and this because he dared to opine that condoms "increase the problem" of AIDS. Maybe, after the massive promotion of contraceptives, these same politicians can show us figures of a decreasing AIDS problem. But we have not seen them yet. What we have seen is an upheaval of catastrophic proportions that generations of western political, financial and industrial leaders brought about in the third world.

The viscious circle created by the 1973 oil crisis remains a monument of shame to these western leaders. With the hefty increase in the price of oil, poor countries started borrowing heavily from rich countries to buy oil from OPEC countries, who then deposited the money in western banks to finance further borrowing by the poor countries. This went on for years until the debt crisis hit the scene - some poor countries were so heavily indebted that they were unable to repay their debts. The solution of our brilliant western leaders was to call for a drastic reduction in welfare spending by third world countries and an increase in resource extraction to feed the industrial machine of the West.

For too long we all thought that this mess did not concern us, that it was all happening in far-away lands and that we were immune to it. Then we woke up one day and saw the price of oil and other raw materials like steel and copper go on a roller-coaster. We realised that we have a problem with global warming and while the West was contemplating its navel, the credit crunch hit us. At the same time the West is getting an unmanageable influx of immigrants from Africa. As we all know very well, Malta has not been spared. I understand that most of these immigrants are not quite mad. They do not risk their lives for the kicks of it. Most of them do it for one simple reason - to escape from the catastrophic mess that western leaders have actively helped bring about in their continent with what the Pope called "purely technically and materially based" politics, the sort of politics where human beings are nothing but expendable and dispensable pawns.

Western political leaders would do better to attend to their civil duties and straighten out the mess they have created. They can leave religious matters, such as the primacy of the Church, in the hands of religious leaders who, over the ages, have shown themselves to be a trifle wiser than their temporal counterparts.

Or is the state separate and distinct from the Church only when it suits the politicians?