POPE GETS HIS OWN YOUTUBE CHANNEL

Monsignor Claudio Maria Celli, who heads the Vatican's social communications office, said the Pope explicitly approved of the online channel.

He said he was "a man of dialogue" who wanted to engage with people wherever they were.

Mgr Celli said the Vatican was launching the channel in part to have some control over the pontiff's image, which he said was already being used on sites, some respectful of the papacy and some not.

The Vatican plans to update the site daily, with its messages available in Italian, German, English and Spanish.

Meanwhile, the Pope said social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace can foster friendships and understanding, but warned they can also isolate people and marginalise others.

He urged a culture of online respect in his annual message for the World Day of Communications.

He welcomed as a "gift" new technologies such as social networking sites, saying they respond to the "fundamental desire" of people to communicate.

But he also warned that "obsessive" virtual socialising can isolate people from real interaction and deepen the digital divide by excluding those already marginalised.

He urged producers to ensure that the content respected human dignity and the "goodness and intimacy of human sexuality."