Contrast this with the statement of last pope, John Paul II (seemingly now regarded as Pope Cuddly), who said that, rather than being a place, "hell indicates the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy". That sounds fine. That sounds like something with a getout clause.

The only way to avoid going to hell, Pope Benedict says, is to make a good confession. (Let's hope he's made a good confession himself over the Hitler Youth episode, or the rest of us sinners face spending an eternity with him down below. ) However, papal forgiveness, it seems, can always be extended to Polish archbishops who collaborate with the secret police, because there were "extraordinary circumstances" at play in Poland at the timef perhaps something like the extraordinary circumstances of the Third Reich? (Ordinary people never have to cope with extraordinary circumstances, you see. ) Oh, and it also extends to Jeffrey Archer, whom the Vatican, in a mystifying act of silence, has allowed to wreck the fascinating and theologically vital gospel of Judas for right-thinking people everywhere.

The pope is really on form with this hell business. Earlier in the month, he reaffirmed that divorced Catholics who re-married could not receive the eucharist. He has censured Fr Jon Sobrino, the liberation theologist friend of assassinated San Salvador archbishop Oscar Romero . . .

and a man who really has suffered enough . . . on the grounds that his writings depicting Jesus as a human being "contain propositions which are either erroneous or dangerous and may cause harm to the faithful".

He accused the European Union of "apostasy" for not mentioning Christianity on the 50th anniversary of its founding, at the same time apparently castigating European women for not having enough babies, global birth rates being what they are and all. He has got into a spat with the Italian government over a proposed law granting rights to homosexual couples. He has dug his heels in about priestly celibacy, and let's not even bring up the incident where he insulted Mohammed.

(In fairness, he has also banned the playing of music by people like the Righteous Brothers at weddings, for which a thousand blessings in a glowing heap on his head forever. ) This kind of posturing from the Holy See tends to inspire sniggers outside the Roman Catholic community. Catholics themselves, typically the less disciplinarian ones, worry that the Vatican's hard line on matters of moral choice is an alienating influence. Irish Catholics tend to fret about what the unionists will think, and what that will mean for the peace process. Generally, nearly everybody regards it as unhelpful at the very least.

But does it really matter what the pope says? Surely Ratzinger can think what he likes there in his little city-state, and preach away to the diminishing converted. Should we really expect the Roman Catholic church to change just because society does? If some people want to be fundamentalist about things, and say rosaries for the souls of the unbaptised, and believe condoms don't help prevent the spread of Aids, it's nobody's business but theirs. As long as we live in a secular society, and as long as we continue to share the view that a secular society is a safer society for everyone in it (that's safer, mind . . . not safe), then where's the harm?

So if you're gay, don't be a Catholic; if you're divorced, don't be a Catholic; if you use birth control, don't be a Catholic; if you believe in the equality of women, don't be a Catholic; if you don't think the pope is infallible, don't be a Catholic (well, all right, that last might eliminate almost everyone). If Catholics don't like papal bull, they can always just leave (unless it so happens that they don't believe in free will, in which case they're probably better off inside). Failing that, they can always wait him out: he's 79, after all; at worst, there can only be about 20 years to go.

No, the only people who really deserve to be pitied under the exigencies of the current Vatican regime . . . the people whose worldly judgment is being drowned out in all this doctrinal din . . . are priests.

Spare a thought, Uncle Joe, for a dwindling group of men, unhappily burdened with the shame of their disgraced colleagues, without the encouragement and companionship of wives and children, trying to do what they can to keep people's spirits up, literally.

It's in the Catholic parishes of the world, not in the Vatican, that marriages break down, that people have abortions, drink too much, beat their wives, beat their children, kill people on the roads, cheat on their tax returns, speak ill of their friends, sin and are sinned against, and turn to their priests for reassurance, solace and forgiveness. The best of priests have long been trying to supply them with all that without the help of brimstone and dogma, and Ratzinger would do well to leave them alone to get on with it.

Diarmuid Doyle is away