At global AIDS summit, churches challenged to take the lead
By Manda Gibson

Straton Gataha's name means "I come with gifts," but some days the Rwandan pastor feels like he doesn't have much to give – like the day an old friend asked him to visit her house and he found her surrounded by 40 HIV-positive women.

She told him she couldn't do anything for their suffering and asked: "You as a pastor, what can you do? Help us."

"They put in me all their hope, as if I were able to do something," he said. "I could do nothing. I just whispered a small prayer – a coward small prayer – and I got out from their compound."

In his car with no one watching, he burst into tears – and then decided not to go back again. "I said, ‘Lord, I will not show up unless you do something,'" he said.

Kay Warren, executive director, Saddleback Church's HIV/AIDS Initiative, challenges participants of the 2006 Global Summit on AIDS and the Church to get "seriously disturbed" by the things that disturb God. “We are seriously disturbed by things that are so trivial," she said. Hear sound clip >> (Photo by Kent Cameron/Saddleback Church)

Months later, friends said they'd like to help him address needs in the community. He knew God was prompting him to respond to HIV/AIDS.

Now he and his congregation are the hands and feet of Jesus to those with HIV. "The infected are afraid, so we hold their hands," he said. "They are alone, so we visit. They feel rejected, so we accept. A few years ago I did nothing. I thought preaching was enough; that was my compassion."

Now he visits homes, provides medicine, cares for daily needs of the sick, and prays with families. His church's ministry reaches 300 people. "They will laugh; we will dance together," he said. "In all this I have noticed the transforming power of the Gospel."

Gataha told his story at the Global Summit on AIDS and the Church, hosted by Pastor Rick and Kay Warren, Nov. 30 – Dec. 1, at Saddleback Church. More than 2,000 pastors, church members, social workers, and medical professionals gathered from 165 ministries and organizations, 178 churches, 39 states, and 18 countries to discuss the role of the Church in responding to HIV/AIDS. Gataha was one of more than 65 speakers, which included pastors, leaders of humanitarian organizations, medical professionals, and government leaders.

Pastor Rick Warren addressed the more than 2,000 church leaders, health care professionals, and social workers gathered for the Summit. (Photo by Allison Cox/Saddleback Church) Sound clip: "For twenty years I was so wrong about AIDS. ..."

"I'm here to tell you there is hope because the Church of Jesus Christ is getting up, and when the Church of Jesus Christ gets up, things happen," Gataha said. "When the Church is getting up, HIV/AIDS will sit down.

"If we don't do something, who will? If we don't show God's love, who will? If we don't show up, who will?"

Rick and Kay Warren: Ending AIDS is churches' goal
Rick Warren, too, said churches must lead the response to HIV/AIDS. "The Church took the lead on abolition, women's right to vote, child labor laws, and civil rights," Warren said. "It is the Church that needs to take the lead on HIV AIDS."

Kay Warren said that when God first opened her eyes to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, she was afraid that getting involved would tarnish her reputation or Saddleback Church's reputation. Her fears, she realized, came from sinful attitudes.

"Jesus was not worried about his reputation ever. He lived boldly. He talked frankly. He hung out with people considered the scum of the earth," Kay said. "I was wrong, and some of you are too."

When Kay first visited Africa, she mentally was pointing a finger at the Church there, wondering why they weren't doing more to stop AIDS. Then she realized her hypocrisy. "The finger I'm pointing hasn't been lifted on behalf of anyone who's HIV positive," she said. "I hadn't created a safe place in my own church for people who were HIV positive."

Now she's leading Saddleback's HIV/AIDS Initiative and encouraging other churches to start their own HIV/AIDS ministries. "The goal I see is to end HIV," she said. "Humanly speaking, it's impossible. When God enters the problem, suddenly things become possible."

"Many people think the Church in the field of AIDS needs to get out of the way," said Robert Redfield, an HIV research pioneer and the co-founder of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. "I think the Church needs to become the global health cornerstone."

HIV/AIDS gives the Church the chance to do what it has been called to do – to love other people and to love God, he said.

"We need to link the Church with medicine and scientific advances. The sooner the Church gets on with it, the sooner the AIDS epidemic will come to an end," he said. "The Church has been on the sidelines, but the Church is awakening. I can feel it."

Kent Hill – assistant administrator of the Bureau for Global Health at USAID (U.S. Agency for International Development) – says that Christians should be on the front line of caring for the sick, the dying, and orphans.

"As a Christian, I am deeply committed to the proposition that the Christian faith has a lot to offer," he said.

Christians also need to help people understand the Christian view of sexuality. "If the biblical, Christian view of sexuality were to gain ground, it would wipe out the AIDS epidemic within a few years," he said

Mark Dybul, U.S. Global AIDS coordinator, reminded the summit audience that in many places with no formal health care, faith communities exist and they can be trained to address HIV/AIDS.

"Where you live should not determine if you live or die from HIV/AIDS," he said. "We cannot succeed in the global struggle against HIV/AIDS without the deep involvement of faith-based organizations."

Richard Feacham, executive director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, wants to see churches and other faith-based organizations get more funding to respond to AIDS. He says churches are particularly well-equipped to care for and support orphans, promote prevention, and conduct HIV testing and treatment. "We ask you to do much, much more," he said.

Sen. Sam Brownback, along with Pastor Rick Warren and Sen. Barack Obama, took an HIV test at a press conference on Dec. 1, World AIDS Day, to help reduce the stigma of HIV/AIDS and as part of Saddleback Church’s 2006 Global Summit on AIDS and the Church. All three men had negative test results. More than 160 attendees took free HIV tests during the Summit. (Photo by Allison Cox/Saddleback Church) Sound clips: Senator Brownback discusses why churches need to become involved | Senator Obama shares AIDS statistics

Sam Brownback, a senator from Kansas, said that American Christians have been given much and must use those gifts to help people who are suffering. "If we'll just give them the crumbs off our table, they can live and we can save our souls," he said.

Barack Obama, a senator from Illinois, agreed that Christians are uniquely positioned to address AIDS. "My Bible tells me that when God sent his only son to earth, it was to heal the sick and comfort the weary; to feed the hungry and clothe the naked; to befriend the outcast and redeem those who strayed from righteousness," he said. "Living his example is the hardest kind of faith – but it is surely the most rewarding.

"Local ministries and churches like Saddleback can, and have, made a real difference – by providing people with a moral framework to make better choices."

Work together, reflect God's love, pastors say
Pastors and ministry leaders agree that it's time for Christians to address AIDS.

It took a lie to awaken Luis Cortes, president of Nueva Esperanza and Esperanza USA, to the AIDS pandemic. When a Hispanic pastor in Philadelphia, Pa., died of AIDS and no clergy were willing to admit his cause of death, Cortes said to himself: "We must do something. This is wrong; we're participating in a lie."

So he helped start a campaign to educate ministers about AIDS and get them to educate each other. "If you can train a clergy person, they can educate more people in a shorter amount of time with less resources than anyone else," he said.

American Christians must step up and help orphans, who are the “forgotten victims of AIDS,” said Dennis Rainey, president of FamilyLife. When he asked attendees how many of them had been adopted, only a handful raised their hands. Then he asked: “How many of you were orphans adopted by God?” Virtually every person raised a hand. (Photo by Tashia Peterman/Saddleback Church)

Dennis Rainey, president and co-founder of FamilyLife, says that the American Church is an army mesmerized and put to sleep by materialism. Christians in America need pure and undefiled religion, which includes caring for orphans.

God is pro-life, pro-orphan, and pro-adoption, Rainey said. And adoption is a physical reminder of a spiritual reality: Because all Christians have been adopted spiritually, physical adoptions reflect God's heart for orphans.

The Raineys adopted a daughter 24 years ago. "We gave her a family; she gave us the heart of God," he said.

God calls his followers to speak up for those who can't speak for themselves, Rainey emphasized.

"Orphans are the forgotten victims of AIDS – a generation of boys and girls with no mommy and daddy to protect them from evil. Can the wealthiest generation in the history of the Church look into the eye of the orphan and say, ‘No'?"

Bishop Charles Blake is pastor of West Angeles Church of God in Christ in Los Angeles and founder and C.E.O. of Save Africa's Children, an organization supporting more than 100,000 children in more than 350 orphan care programs in Africa. Churches must put aside their differences and work together to stop AIDS, he said.

"Each humanitarian organization, each church has a piece of the puzzle," he said. "A seat at the table shouldn't be refused to anyone wanting to assist in the endeavor."

John Ortberg, teaching pastor at Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in Menlo Park, Calif., shared his own message of unity, encouraging Christians to reach out to everyone with the love of Jesus.

The weapons of Jesus' Kingdom, he said, are things like blankets, rakes, medicine, and open wallets. "If the Gospel isn't good news for everybody, it isn't good news for anybody," he said.

Kay Warren, wife of Saddleback Church pastor Rick Warren and the inspiration for the church’s second annual Global Summit on AIDS and the Church, greeted Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda between sessions at the Summit. (Photo by Allison Cox/Saddleback Church)

He believes the Church will win the battle through sacrificial love for vulnerable people, hope in God, and holding to the truth of the Gospel.

"The Church is here because we have an answer: It's Jesus in our hearts," he said.

Eugene Rivers is pastor of Azusa Christian Community in Boston, Mass., and special assistant to the president of the Pan African Charismatic Evangelical Congress, formed to organize churches in the United States to assist their counterparts in Africa in dealing with AIDS. He believes the Global Summit on AIDS and the Church was a kairos moment, when crisis intersects with opportunity to initiate a new spiritual revolution. Throughout history, the Church has offered hope and served as a resource during tragedy.

"God has given the Body of Christ a unique and revolutionary opportunity," he said. "We must translate the Gospel so people can see in us the love of God."

Pastor Rick Warren spoke with NGO presidents and Summit speakers (from left) Sammy Mah of World Relief, Wess Stafford of Compassion International, and Richard Stearns of World Vision, between sessions at the 2006 Global Summit on AIDS and the Church. (Photo by Allison Cox/Saddleback Church)

When Mah became president of World Vision, he visited a woman dying of AIDS in a Rwandan slum. He gave her a flashlight to light the dark room she called home. Then he saw her church coming to bathe and feed her and make plans for caring for her children after her death. "The church was the light in that dark place," he said.

It's time for Christians – including Christian humanitarian organizations – to work together without worrying about who receives credit, he said. "I only want the credit to go to one place – the Lord Jesus."

He encourages Christians to sit with pastors from the parts of the world most affected by AIDS and say: "How can we come alongside and help you respond?"

"This world is calling us as the Body of Christ to respond," he said. "The time is now."

Stafford has been attending AIDS conferences for 20 years. But he said the Global Summit on AIDS and the Church was the first such gathering that gave him hope because he sensed the right people had come together at the right place and time with the right motivation, spirit, and strategy.

"What's needed is a great groundswell of compassion," he said. "It's got to begin today. This issue is what our children and grandchildren are going to hold us accountable for.

Stearns, too, sensed something unique at the Summit. "This conference is my dream come true," he said. "The AIDS pandemic will not be solved without the Church of Jesus Christ showing up to be the Church."

The needs of the AIDS pandemic are acute, but the American Church, made up of the wealthiest Christians in history, has the resources to respond, he said.

"We must answer the question ‘What would Jesus do?' and not fail to do it," Stearns said. One way or the other, this will be the defining moment for the Church of Jesus Christ."