No give and take on papal organ donations

THE Pope's organs belong to the church and cannot be donated, say Vatican officials.

Despite Pope Benedict XVI championing transplants - as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger he carried a donor card for decades in his native Germany - the church now say his donor card was rendered void when he became pontiff in 2005.

Monsignor Georg Gaenswein addressed the issue in a letter to a German doctor who has been using the fact that the Pope possessed a donor card to recruit other donors. Mr Gaenswein sought to put the matter to rest, saying any references to the now invalid document were mistaken.

Polish Archbishop Zygmunt Zimowski, head of the Vatican's health office, told La Repubblica newspaper a Pope's body should remain intact since it is de facto church property.

"It is also understandable in view of possible future veneration," he said, referring to sainthood. "This doesn't take anything away from the validity and the beauty of the gift of organ donation," he added.