God, AIDS, Africa & HOPE

Reflections / Gedanken

09/18/2009 • 11:03 pm 12

18.09.2009 Criminal HIV?

“Nick Rhoades, an Iowa man sentenced May 8 to 25 years in prison for failing to disclose his HIV status to a male sexual partner, had his sentence reduced to five years of probation without jail time in a September 11 reconsideration hearing, The Iowa Independent reports.”

It is indeed an interesting question on whether disclosure of a HIV status can or should always be judged by legal means. In the existing climate of stigmatization and discrimination it is very unlikely that all people infected will be willing or able to disclose before being sexually active with somebody else. Punishment for non-disclosure, often even if no infection took place is growing in the legal systems of nations and I tend to disagree.
I would argue that the onus lies on both parties to protect and if I want to engage in sexual activities where the exchange of body fluids is likely, I have to treat every unknown and maybe even every known person as if he/she is carrier of the virus.  It always takes two to dance one says – and this applies also to such cases like the one above.
I personally don’t think that the tool of the criminal code is a very good tool to prevent infections; I think it will rather make it more unlikely that people get tested because at least they could argue then, that they did not know at all.
I see with concern that more and more also African countries develop laws in that regard, even punishing people when they did not know of their infection and no infection took place.
Extra criminal laws in this regard puts people living with the virus very quick into the criminal corner – that is not what we need to stop the stigma and in doing so,  creating an environment where we are really able to stop the spread of the virus.

Filed under: HIV Prevention, Politics and Society, , , , , , , , , , , ,

08/29/2009 • 1:04 am Comments Off on 29.08.2009 Religious Leaders Absent in the Anti-AIDS Fight & the POZ initiative

29.08.2009 Religious Leaders Absent in the Anti-AIDS Fight & the POZ initiative

The following article I found today on the website “the body” – and caught my attention:
Religious Leaders Absent in the Anti-AIDS Fight  August 21, 2009
Though they exert great influence in the communities in which they serve, religious leaders are not doing enough to fight HIV/AIDS, said experts at the recent ninth International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, held in Bali, Indonesia. “Many religious groups and leaders are unwilling to address HIV/AIDS and make it a priority. Their commitment level is quite low, particularly when compared to the size of their budget and the amount of work they do,” said Donald Messer of the US-based Center of Church and Global AIDS. “We’ve been talking about HIV/AIDS and the religious groups’ response for three decades now. We’re still talking too much even now,” said Fiji’s Dominica Abo. The “most powerful contribution” religious leaders can make is addressing stigma, discrimination, and biases that put groups like women at high risk for the disease. The epidemics impact on women and children needs to be addressed from a faith-based perspective, said the Rev. Youngsook Charlene Kang of the United Methodist Church in the United States, noting that women account for nearly half of all infections worldwide. “We need to call on religious leaders to educate and create new pathways within our churches for parishioners to learn the role that faith communities can play.” Messer noted that many conservative Muslim and Christian groups continue to preach against contraceptives, including condoms, believing they promote promiscuity. “[Yet] when used directly and consistently, condoms are humanity’s best protection and weapon against HIV/AIDS,” he said. “Some religious leaders are more eager to preserve the purity or correctness of theological perspectives than their task to save human lives.”
I guess, that the POZ initiative of HOPE Cape Town and the Justice & Peace Commission of the Archdiocese of Cape Town will make a difference and highlight, that we take the fight against stigma, discrimination and bias serious. By working with and for priests, religious and seminarians, who are living with the virus, we address the double stigma of being infected and being infected as a “sacred” person, so to speak.  In this sense we can see a double discrimination – and of course also the bias, as many church leaders do not acknowledge that the pandemic also is amongst us, the clergy.
I am personally thrilled that we got the permission from the local Archbishop of Cape Town to work in this field – and when I will visit the papal council for health care workers end of the year, I will address it and hope that they join hands to work for a transformation from stigma to charisma.

Filed under: HIV and AIDS, HOPE Cape Town Association & Trust, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

08/21/2009 • 5:09 pm Comments Off on 21.08.2009 Judging people…

21.08.2009 Judging people…

With the elevation of the Pius brotherhood through Benedikt XVI into the public eye we all can see and sense a new dawn of those, who are living in the past of the RC church and have refused to develop their faith. This in itself isn’t worrying. If people feel fine with the good old days and they want to keep them until they die – why not, if they apply it only to themselves. The danger is that with all the discussion now in the public forum, the old pictures from judgement, from evil, hell and condemnation, from a God acting like a policeman or a bookkeeper emerge again and that is the scary part. Reading about a priest in Austria starting to scare First Communion kids with hell and eternal condemnation – such teaching is surely encouraged through all the debate about the Pius brotherhood.

To spell it out again and again – and you can ask my community in Cape Town, they know it meanwhile and dream of it and can memorize it: God is love – unconditional love – and nothing ever can make us say that somebody has fallen out of the grace and mercy of God. Nobody! All those nevertheless doing it, denying that God is so much greater than all our thinking and understanding.

And this non judgemental unconditional love applies especially when it comes to such tricky topics like HIV and AIDS. There are no innocent babies and no not so innocent adults. There are only brothers and sisters with a certain condition. Point. No “Moralin”, no “Gardinenpredigt” – just acknowledgement, embracing of the condition and then the question, how to deal with it in a way beneficial to the person and his or her environment. Changing the stigma to a tool of compassion and mercy, self-knowledge and maturity.

I guess, if there is anything people living with the virus need besides good treatment and good friends it is people fighting like hell the stigma in our societies, fighting the travel bans, the discrimination, the human rights violations and fighting those who point fingers. And I have learned in my life: The more hostile people point fingers, the more they have to hide…

Filed under: HIV and AIDS, Reflection, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

08/20/2009 • 4:13 pm Comments Off on 20.08.2009 Positive clergy

20.08.2009 Positive clergy

Whether it is because people have read some postings or otherwise heard about it, it is amazing that there are people out there believing that a normal priest, a normal religious can not be HIV positive. Why not – I ask back. Also clergy, religious and seminarians, even nuns are only human beings, having a life before entering the state of religious life or being ordained. They continue to be human beings with all what comes with it, they can fail and raise again, and not only once.

Being a priest, religious or seminarian means to be called to holiness, but humanity remains – holiness without humanity, mistakes, errors and a life with ups and downs is not existing. There is nobody being born, raised and then lived a life without falter in this world. And when it comes to the official saints of the church, their holiness can only shine against the humanity, they have shown and experienced in their lives.

Only knowing to be weak, to make mistakes, to go wrong ways – and accepting that, can lead to maturity and to show compassion to others as I am able to show compassion to myself.

Writing this, I also feel, that even to think in the categories of “right” or “wrong” in connection with HIV is wrong. It is not even up to me to judge anybody in this matter. Decisions, we humans make and have to make every day leads to all sort of consequences. The main thing is to accept the consequences and to live your life to the fullest. Leave the judgment to God…

Filed under: HIV and AIDS, Reflection, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

08/02/2009 • 7:48 pm 3

02.08.2009 Living with HIV

I have added on the blogroll “living with hiv – as it happens”. I find this blog a very important one as it shows without attitude or drama how life develops after a positive test result. The blog is anonymous and this shows again, how difficult it is to get it out. Here in South Africa, the Treatment Action Campaign advocates the “coming out” of HIV positive people and sometimes I have the impression, that is is almost done in a militant and pushy way. I don’t agree with it at all. Living with the virus is as intimate as faith – and it needs time and trust to open up and to talk about things which are so close to myself. Everybody has the right to be silent and to decide himself or herself, to whom to reveal the news.

People can react sometimes quite funny – for me as a counsellor it is important to advice a newly diagnosed person to look out for one person, with whom he can share the news and with whom he can discuss his joys and sufferings, his grievance and anxiety related to the virus occupying parts of his or her body. It is indeed a roller coaster to get used to the virus, to get used to treatment, and to be able to live a life to the fullest.

I feel often sad seeing how prejudice creates stigmatisation, discrimination – there is still a long way to go until we just accept a person living with the virus without even considering what could have gone wrong. It really does not matter in my opinion how and when somebody was infected – it is for me as a person, a Christian, a priest completely uninteresting – the only duty I have is to encourage somebody to live, to experience the unconditional love of God and to make the best out of his or her life.

Here in South Africa, we also have AIDS orphanages, and I always tend to flip out when I hear people saying, they want to see the innocent AIDS babies and clearly trying to distinguish between them and those, who have acquired the virus during adulthood. First of all there are no AIDS babies, but babies living with the virus. And secondly there is no innocence or guilt when dealing with a person living with the virus.  We should stop even using such words – and leave the morals at home somewhere in the corner where they don’t disturb our judgement and our commitment towards other people. Lets forget about judging people – and just embrace them as they are. This is the way, we also want to be dealt with … at least the way, I want to be dealt with…

Filed under: General, HIV and AIDS, HOPE Cape Town Association & Trust, Reflection, , , , , , , , , , , ,

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