Current Articles |
Press Archives
..............................................................................................................................................................................................
DIASPORA DIGEST:
The ‘Positive’ Contributions of HIV/AIDS
by George E. Curry
NNPA Editor-in-Chief
BANGKOK, Thailand (NNPA) – Africa is home to only 10 percent of the world’s population, but accounts for 83 percent of all AIDS deaths. The virus has killed 10 times more people in Africa than war. In the United States, Blacks make up 12 percent of the population but 54 percent of the 40,000 new HIV infections reported each year and approximately half of newly-reported AIDS cases.
Pernessa C. Seele, founder of a New York grassroots organization that mobilizes the faith community on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, sees some positive news in those gloomy statistics.
“The good thing about AIDS is that it has provided a bridge for the African Diaspora to come back together again,” says Seele. “It’s a destructive force, but I think it’s also important for us to also realize this is a moment that we have in time to bring us back together. When we all come back together, people will learn that we are so much alike."
When asked to amplify, the Lincolnville, S.C. native responds: “AIDS is like when everybody had to sit in the back of the bus in the segregated South. It didn’t matter if you were a doctor, lawyer or cook. Everybody sat at the back of the bus. And that was our strength. I think our strength today is coming together as a people around HIV – We all got it. It’s devastating to every Black community everywhere."
In 1989, Seele organized the Black Church Week of Prayer for the Healing of AIDS. She began with churches in Harlem and today more than 15,000 churches focus on HIV/AIDS during the first week of March of each year. But the road has not been easy.
“The epidemic started out as a gay, White man’s disease,” she recalls. “And that idea took hold. The faith community worldwide, not just the Black faith community, said, ‘AIDS is a sin, it’s connected to homosexuality, it’s connected to promiscuity,’ all the things that churches didn’t want to deal with. And that has taken hold all over the globe. When you look at our community, the debate has got to end. Nobody is being cured. It’s not preventing HIV and we’re still debating it. That’s one of our biggest challenges."
Many religious leaders were slow to meet that challenge.
Rev. Jeremiah Wright, pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, discusses how he became involved in an interview with “Week of Prayer,” a magazine published by The Balm of Gilead.
“One of our members who was dying of AIDS contacted me,” he remembers. “When I went to his home, his wife had moved out of the house, taken the children; she took everything but the carpet. As we sat on the living room floor, this man was crying to me, saying, ‘Rev., no one should have to die like this."
That gave birth to the HIV/AIDS ministry that was established at the church in 1971. Today, the HIV/AIDS Support Ministry at Trinity United Church of God provides HIV/AIDS case management, drug counseling, prevention programs, education and weekly support group meetings.
Rev. Wright’s experience has been repeated across the country.
“We have seen a major improvement,” Seele states. “Fifteen years ago, Black pastors would not discuss HIV. Today, we can look at model churches throughout the United States that are providing HIV testing in their churches and HIV case management. We have model churches like Antioch Baptist Church in Cleveland, Metropolitan Interdenominational Church in Nashville, St. John’s United Methodist Church in Houston, Arc of Refuge in Oakland, Beautiful Gates in Wilmington, Del. and so many others."
Many pastors preach a sermon on AIDS during the first week of March to kick off a week of HIV/AIDS-related activities. Some also host “get tested” workshops, place AIDS facts in the church bulletin and hold community forums.
Still, the faith community could do more, Seele observes.
“It’s easier to debate than do the work,” she explains. “It’s like talking about losing weight. “’I’m going to start my diet tomorrow. I’m going to the gym, I’m going to do low carbs.’ You’re not going to do anything – you’re just talking about it."
”
When Seele wanted to expand her work to Africa, she did more than talk about it. Working with more than a dozen major denominations, her group has set up HIV/AIDS programs in Cote d’lvoire, Nigeria, Kenya, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
“When I’m working in Africa, we have blood supplies that are sill not safe, we have no universal precautions, and most people in Africa still haven’t heard the word AIDS. I can go to some remote village and find certain products. But I can’t find an AIDS education program after 22 years of the epidemic. Something is wrong with that."
And there was also something wrong with the way information was shared – or not shred.
Seele says, “Cote d’lvoire didn’t know about the epidemic in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe didn’t know about the epidemic in Nigeria and nobody knew about the epidemic in the African-American community. And we’re all being devastated by the disease."
She remains convinced that the devastation will bring Africans and African-Americans closer to one another.
“It’s devastating to see the destructive force of AIDS in our universe among our people,” she says. “But there is some good in everything.”
..............................................................................................................................................................................................
Current Articles |
Press Archives
|
