Would You Tell Your Pastor? Your Congregation? That You are HIV Positive

Scientists believe AIDS first crossed over into humans 80 years ago in Africa. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science in the United States recently reported through gene analysis that AIDS in humans entered into the Western Hemisphere from Central Africa, possibly from Haitian Professionals living in the Congo as early as 1966 through Haiti and then from Haiti to the USA around 1969. That is a dozen years before AIDS was discovered in the United States and Canada in the early 1980s.

We are all aware there are regions, such as Sub-Saharan Africa that are affected more by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. It is sometimes easier to talk about statistics such as Sub-Saharan Africa harboring nearly 65% of the estimated 40.3 million people living with HIV/AIDS or the 18 million orphans projected by 2010 than it is to talk about AIDS in our own communities.

The Moravian Church in North America has responded to the AIDS crises in Tanzania by generously supporting the Adopt-a-Village program which provides assistance with education, clothing, food, and basic health care to villages caring for children orphaned primarily due to AIDS. Likewise AIDS Ministry of the Board of World Mission has sent an assessment team to South Africa to learn more about the AIDS crisis in Moravian communities in that country. It is easy to pay attention abroad and think it is the only place that is still suffering with this pandemic and the stigma associated with the disease.

World AIDS Day (December 1st) reminds us to not forget those in our own pews living with HIV/AIDS. While attending the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America’s (ELCA) HIV/AIDS Consultation in September, we were shown the face of statistics here in the United States in meeting Robert. Robert reminded us there is still stigma here in our own communities, our own churches. How is it that we claim to minister faithfully to those “abroad” living with HIV/AIDS, yet are often unaware of the person in our own pew living with HIV/AIDS? I must admit that I have fallen short in looking to my own community for those affected by AIDS. What follows is one man’s journey living with HIV/AIDS.

In 2001 when I became so ill I was hospitalized, the doctors advised my family that I would probably have only 6 months, at best, to live. This was also when my family first learned of my HIV Status. My family then felt the best they could do would be to sell my house, put enough possessions in storage to see me through the necessities for the remainder of my life and leave. After two months in the hospital, I was released without medications and nowhere to go — I had lain in a bed for 7 weeks and only started to walk during the week prior to release. My case manager from the Colorado AIDS Project was able to get me into a Catholic Hospice run by the Missionaries of Charity, where we started the task of getting medications and medical care. I spent the next 6 months of my life in that hospice learning how to walk again and working to make myself well. My family still has very limited contact with me….

Fortunately, I found a community, in Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in Denver, Colorado, that would accept me as I am with my illness and give me a sense of value. They became the replacement for my family. That Church gave me the sense of value necessary to make sure I take each little box of pills every day. I find it interesting that the Gospel Texts for the past two Sundays, Luke 13:10-17 and Luke 14:7-14 relate exactly to what Our Savior’s did with me. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t say the church, on a whole, has always been an example of these Texts.

I have lived with AIDS for 26 years; however I have been infected with HIV for only 7 years. I lived through the thick of the epidemic beginning in 1981 with the loss of my first friend and over the next 8 years, the loss of more than 25 friends. In those earlier years, the church was nowhere to be found. In fact, we were unable to locate churches to host memorial services for those who had died. I attended many services in bars, restaurant party rooms, and private homes. To say the least, the Church was not there in those days and still is somewhat behind the time…. We, as the Church, have a little catching up to do…. If it had not been for a few pockets of Christian people and Ministers living the word of God in those early years, there would have been no response from the Church. In the early years it was easy to ignore the groups affected. Today it’s easy to look elsewhere to address the illness. In the past three years, I have had the good fortune of conducting University Sessions at the GMEs [Global Mission Event of the ELCA]. I’m pleased to note that at the first GME, the response to the question, “Would you tell your Pastor if you were HIV positive?” was answered with a majority of NO’s and this past year it was answered with all YES’s. But, the answer to the question of “would you tell members of the congregation if you were HIV positive?” remains at more than half saying no. [Churches need] an education not only to teach the difficulties and realities of [living with AIDS], but to advise [our constituency] they have the very real possibly of having a parishioner sitting in their pews that has learned they are HIV positive and are afraid to talk to anyone because of judgment and prejudice. Both [attitudes] have no place today as the virus grows in increasing numbers in people of color, Hispanics, women, teens, and people over 50. This is no longer a gay, white man’s disease. We know that 1 in 4 persons infected in the US don’t know they are infected and without question this can only lead into increased infections.

…To this day, there are those who say that AIDS is a judgment from God for our sins. My answer to that is that rather than a judgment from God, it is a test from God — A test of all those who call themselves believers to exhibit the grace and love that God gave them…. (Exert prepared and presented by Robert Schrader at the ELCA HIV/AIDS Consultation held in Chicago, Illinois, September 7-9, 2007.) In October Mary Kategile and I had the privilege of speaking at Fairview Moravian Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, about stewardship and missions. While in Winston-Salem, I learned there are Moravians participating in a local AIDS ministry called AIDS Care Service (ACS). ACS provides a Housing Placement Program and a Day Activities Program for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). At Holly Haven, ACS provides a home to care for persons who are HIV positive, homebound, or in advanced stages of AIDS not served by other programs. Three Latino Programs were added in 2002 and 2004 to provide referrals for Latino brothers and sisters living with HIV and to offer information and education about HIV in Spanish. The Food Panty also became a part of ACS in 2004.

In claiming to be a Missional Church, Mission starts at home. I challenge all Moravians, myself included, to seek out opportunities to minister to those in our neighborhood living with HIV/AIDS and walk beside them in their journey. In so doing not only will we be a blessing, but as we have experienced when we give to the Adopt-a-Village program, we are blessed.

Kim Bartholomew serves as the HIV/AIDS coordinator for Likewise Ministries, the HIV/AIDS Ministry of the Board of World Mission. December 1 is World AIDS Day.