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BY JOHN W. COLEMAN JR. 

Church leaders passionate about ending the HIV/AIDS pandemic recently commended United Methodist donors for bolstering efforts toward that goal; but they also called for more church-wide commitment and urgency to achieving an AIDS-free world by 2020.

The United Methodist Global AIDS Fund Committee recognized and thanked the Baltimore-Washington and Virginia conferences for their generous, pace-setting support of the fund at a modest gathering, Oct. 16, at Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington D.C. About 50 attendees also heard reports on anti-HIV/AIDS work being done in Africa and an impassioned address by the Rev. Dr. Pauline Muchina, a noted advocate and leader of the United Nation's campaign to end the worldwide spread of AIDS.

Fund director Donald E. Messer reported that more than $3 million in gifts to the unapportioned fund since it began in 2005 have been distributed in small grants to aid "church-oriented, Christ-centered AIDS ministries" in 38 countries. He thanked the general boards of Church and Society and Global Ministries for their fundraising, advocacy and staff support in sponsoring four national conferences on HIV/AIDS (three Lighten the Burden conferences and the African American Women and HIV/AIDS conference).

However, getting local churches to directly address the problem, donate to the fund and develop ministries of outreach to victims remains a challenge, Messer and other speakers noted. "Almost 30 million people have died," said Messer, "and yet, in most churches we can't get 30 minutes of time to talk about the issue of HIV/AIDS."

Quoting John 13:34-35, Muchina challenged her fellow Christians to prove they are disciples of Jesus Christ through their active love for others, including those struggling with HIV and AIDS. "Imagine people who are suffering and dying alone while preachers are busy preaching," she said. "How many people around the world will know we are Christians by the way we love them, not because of the way we preach or go about condemning this or that, but because of the way we call for funding to support ministries and justice for victims...." Too often, when the nation's economic crisis and budget cuts are discussed, she complained, "the voice that is missing is the Christian voice, the voice of love."

Bishop Fritz Mutti, who has spent much of his retirement promoting the cause of ending HIV/AIDS to the denomination, credited his fellow bishops for their leadership in raising support for the Global AIDS Fund in their areas. He presented plaques to the Baltimore-Washington and Virginia conferences for their leadership in giving, noting that only one other conference has given more.

Washington Area Bishop John R. Schol recalled meeting three people important in his life who each contracted HIV: his basketball hero, former NBA star Earvin "Magic" Johnson, who came to Sharp Street Memorial United Methodist Church in Baltimore in 2004 to help stimulate awareness, hope and response to the disease; a close friend who died from AIDS; and a Zimbabwean youth whom the conference helped to complete school and prepare for college but who also died from AIDS.

"This is some of the most important ministry we do as United Methodists because they (whom we try to help) are our heroes, our friends and our hope for the future," said Schol, who noted that Baltimore-Washington may have been the first conference to reach and surpass its goal for support of the fund.

The Rev. Glenn Rowley, newly appointed Director of Mission and Global Justice for the Virginia Conference, represented Bishop Charlene Kammerer in receiving thanks from the Global AIDS Fund for the conference's support. Admitting a recent "lag" in efforts, he reported that conference leaders are exploring ways to redouble their commitment to the fund.

Rowley recalled being among the first missionaries to encounter HIV/AIDS and its lethal consequences when he and his wife served in Mozambique in the 1980s. He remembered a young indigenous physician at United Methodist, rural Chicuque Hospital who died after contracting the disease while performing surgeries without gloves because of a lack of supplies.

"This disease is has been a part of my life, and I hope that by 2020 it is no longer a part of our lives," said Rowley.

Beatrice Gbanga, Coordinator of United Methodist Health Programs in West Africa, reported to the gathering on work being done among HIV/AIDS victims and their families in her native Sierra Leone, thanks to the Global AIDS Fund's assistance. She cited food support, health survival kits, disease prevention and management classes, anti-AIDS clubs in schools, and pre- and post-delivery care for pregnant mothers and their babies, including HIV prevention, testing and treatment measures.

"Many people who are HIV-positive are outcasts from their families and communities," Gbanga confided. "But we never have enough funds because more people are coming forward now. They used to stand back (out of fear) but they are coming for testing and help. We're always seeking more support."

Gbanga showed a slide of a smiling young woman who, like many, lost both her parents to AIDS, but who nonetheless, finished high school and is enrolled in nursing school. "The message from my friends, those living with HIV and AIDS," she shared, "is please continue to help us survive...(and) advocate so we can have an AIDS-free world."

Muchina, a native of Kenya and a senior adviser for UNAIDS in Washington, claimed a strong possibility of achieving that goal. "An AIDS-free world is possible because we know how HIV is transmitted and how it can be stopped, and we have scientific and social strategies in place to get it done," she said. "The problem is having the will and power to do it."

She cited a new UN global effort to help remedy mother-to-child prenatal transmission of the AIDS as a means of ending the disease by 2015. "Your church can be in the forefront of that effort. This AIDS fund is demonstrating that there is power and the will to stop AIDS in its tracks."

Having watched the dedication of the new Martin Luther King, Jr., memorial on the National Mall that morning, Muchina reminded her audience that the nation's capital has its own HIV/AIDS epidemic with one of the highest transmission rates in the country. Recalling King's 1968 "I Have a Dream" speech, the young theologian activist with master's and doctorate degrees in religion proclaimed that King's words are just as relevant for a new and equally urgent cause today.

"Just as he kept saying ‘Now is the time' for God's children to treat each other justly, now is the time again for us to be liberated from this disease—not yesterday, not tomorrow but today" said Muchina. "The AIDS epidemic is again ravaging the same people King was talking about then. People are dying in huge numbers again in this country, a country full of riches and all kinds of wealth. What have we done as churches to stop it, to help people living with HIV to have a healthy, fulfilling life, a productive life?"

The Rev. Kent Millard, recently retired pastor of St. Luke's United Methodist Church in Indianapolis, Ind., ended the evening with another passionate appeal for pledged donations to the fund, an appeal he bolstered with his own $1,000 donation in honor of his recently deceased wife. Recounting moving stories of African children whose lives were damaged by AIDS but who survived nonetheless and became young leaders in their communities, Millard attributed their opportunities and those of other children and adults struggling with sickness and loss to the help made possible by the Global AIDS Fund.