VATICAN CITY - POPE Benedict XVI leaves this week on his first trip to Africa - the fastest-growing region for the Roman Catholic church - saying on Sunday that he wants to bring a message of hope to a continent suffering from poverty, disease and armed conflict.

The German-born pope, who has mainly visited the affluent West during his nearly four-year papacy, departs on Tuesday on a seven-day pilgrimage that will take him to Cameroon and Angola.

TOUCHY TOPICS ON AGENDA Pope Benedict said that as he sets out for Africa, he has in mind 'the victims of hunger, disease, injustice, fratricidal conflicts and every form of violence which unfortunately continue to afflict adults and children, without sparing missionaries' and volunteers working on the continent. Pope Benedict has never spoken explicitly on condom use, but in a 2005 address to African bishops he said the church was in the forefront in efforts to treat the victims of Aids. The Vatican encourages sexual abstinence to fight spread of the disease. ... more

The Catholic Church experienced extraordinary growth in Africa over the past century - it now counts nearly 20 per cent of the continent's population - helped by Pope John Paul II's visits to 42 countries.

For Pope Benedict, whose only previous stop in Africa was in Kinshasa in 1987 as a cardinal, the continent presents major challenges and opportunities.

He is expected to address them in meetings with Muslim representatives, bishops, health workers and women's advocacy groups.

He also will meet with political leaders in the two countries, both accused of corrupt use of oil revenues that enrich a small elite while most of their people are impoverished.

Africa produces priests at a higher rate than anywhere in the world but finds itself in competition with Islam in Cameroon, Nigeria and elsewhere, while evangelical churches are winning over young people much as they are doing in Latin America, once a bastion of Catholicism.

Some priests and nuns working with victims of the Aids pandemic ravaging the continent are questioning the church's opposition to condoms. Celibacy required of Roman Catholic priests is a challenge on a continent where many cultures consider men boys until they have fathered children.

In his remarks on Sunday, Pope Benedict cited Africa's 'thousand differences and deep religious soul, its ancient cultures and its difficult path of development and reconciliation, its grave problems, painful wounds and enormous potential and hopes'. Pope Benedict said he wants to invigorate the growing church in Africa.

The trip will be Pope Benedict's 11th foreign pilgrimage as pope. He also is planning to visit Jordan and Israel in May. -- AP