|
|
|
Pope Benedict XVI, during the Recitation of the Angelus, 29 November 2009:
World AIDS Day is observed on 1 December. My thoughts and prayer accompany everyone who has been touched by this illness, particularly the children, the very poor and those who are rejected. The Church spares no effort to combat AIDS through its institutions and personnel dedicated to this task. I urge all people to offer their own contributions through prayer and concrete attention, so that those affected by the HIV virus will experience the presence of the Lord who gives comfort and hope. In conclusion, I hope that, by multiplying and coordinating these efforts, it will be possible to stop and overcome this illness.
SYMPOSIUM OF EPISCOPAL CONFERENCES
OF AFRICA AND MADAGASCAR
GREETING FOR WORLD AIDS DAY 2009
To all our Brothers and Sisters of the Catholic Church in Africa and its Islands, to all men and women of good will, and especially to all who are infected by HIV or affected by AIDS: greetings and best wishes to you all on World AIDS Day 2009. The theme this year “Universal Access and Human Rights” challenges discriminatory laws, policies and practices that stand in the way of access for all to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support. This fits well within the theme of the II Synod of Bishops for Africa: The Church in Africa at the Service of Reconciliation, Justice and Peace: “You are the salt of the earth. . . . You are the light of the world.”
The Church is second to none in facing HIV in Africa and caring for people infected and affected. Earlier this year, responding to a journalist en route to the continent, Pope Benedict XVI said: “The most efficient, most truly present player in the fight against AIDS is the Catholic Church herself.” And we African Bishops know he is right.
Constantly present among millions of Africans who are badly affected by the pandemic, we see how AIDS continues to ravage our populations, even if it is slipping down the agenda of governments, civil society and international organizations. At a time when official concerns about the pandemic are receding, we re-affirm theologically that the Body of Christ has AIDS, and express our pastoral determination as Family of God to provide fitting responses. For our continent is still the worst afflicted.
We plead for sustained support to meet the needs of many. Assistance is as sorely needed as ever. HIV and AIDS have not gone away, despite premature impressions to the contrary. The assumption that treatment is now available to everyone is false. Only a third of those who need treatment get it and, after two years, only 60% are still on treatment; for every two people on treatment, five are newly infected. Globally new HIV infections are still outnumbering those going on treatment and those dying of AIDS. The number of orphans, abused, vulnerable and infected children continues to grow exponentially. Stigma remains a powerful enemy. The Church knows very well the real impact of HIV and of AIDS upon her sons and daughters, and it will be so for decades to come.
Although ART requires a lifelong commitment to staying on the drugs, in sub-Saharan Africa a goodly number of ART patients stop taking their meds within two years because they can’t afford the regular transport costs to the hospital or don’t have access to sufficient food to make drug adherence possible.
The pandemic gravely compromises development and justice. The global recession and economic downturn have a detrimental impact on our brothers and sisters infected and affected by HIV and AIDS. Climbing prices of food and other basic necessities are hampering progress of treatment, because people cannot afford the food essential to support their medication. Further, increased hunger and desperation are making people resort to sex as a means of survival. So any response that attempts to tackle HIV and AIDS in isolation is doomed to fail.
For the tide to turn, the impact of all contributing factors must be recognised and tackled holistically: wars; fragile or failing states; inequality between men and women; the ravages of climate change and many more. All these make the poor even poorer, more dispossessed, more vulnerable to HIV and, if infected, more likely to develop AIDS.
HIV-AIDS is not just a medical problem and investing in pharmaceutics alone will not work. Foreign governments and UN agencies are now pushing for investment in national healthcare systems in countries of Africa as their strategy for addressing HIV along with malaria and tuberculosis.
With the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, we seriously warn that the problem cannot be overcome by relying exclusively or primarily on the distribution of prophylactics. Only a strategy based on education to individual responsibility in the framework of a moral view of human sexuality, especially through conjugal fidelity, can have a real impact on the prevention of this disease.
The Church’s understanding of marriage as the total, reciprocal and exclusive communion of love between a man and a woman prompts the most effective behaviours for preventing the sexual transmission of disease: namely, abstinence before marriage and fidelity within marriage.
We address ourselves particularly to our youth, in whom we firmly believe. Let no one deceive you into thinking that you cannot control yourself. Abstinence is the best protection. For those who are not married, it is also the only moral course of action. Accordingly, formation of the human person is the true recipe, the key to it all, and we are intent on preparing you to be tomorrow’s salt of the earth and light of the world, active, generous and responsible members of society and Church.
SECAM thanks all those who are so generously involved in this difficult apostolate of formation, love and care.
May international Catholic solidarity continue supporting the long-term commitment of the Church in Africa to raise awareness, to accompany the infected and the affected, to form the youth, and to face this great challenge – along with many others – in a spirit of inclusivity, reconciliation, and greater harmony in families, communities, parishes and all dimensions of Church life.
May our Holy Mother Mary, Queen of Africa and Health of the Sick, intercede for us at the throne of grace. Amen.
+ Polycarp Cardinal Pengo
Archbishop of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
President of SECAM
To the Jesuits of Africa and Madagascar
Learning to face AIDS as a family
Dear companions and friends in the Lord, on this World AIDS Day I invite you to meditate with me on our learning to face AIDS as a family.
When AIDS began to afflict Africa about 25 years ago, few of us reacted well. People who were HIV-positive or suffered from AIDS could easily find themselves condemned, rejected, cast out and treated “as good as dead”. How different things must be now, wherever belonging God’s family means reacting as Jesus showed us.
Many spiders working together can tie up a lion.
Fifteen years ago the first Synod for Africa enculturated and indeed africanized Vatican II with the inspiring expression Church-Family of God in Africa. The Church has invited her sons and daughters to re-imagine what it means to be Christian as a family community. For the last seven years now, the African Jesuit AIDS Network (AJAN) has been enabling our Assistancy to develop ways of facing HIV and AIDS in our works and communities, individually and with our co-workers, as Ignatian family.
It takes more than one stream to fill a river.
We cannot home in on ‘the problem’ without understanding the context, the rich cluster of complex factors which encircle any human situation. “AIDS is a pandemic, together with malaria and tuberculosis, which is decimating African populations and severely damaging their economic and social life. It is not to be looked at as either merely a medical-pharmaceutical problem or solely as an issue of a change in human behaviour. It is truly an issue of integral development and justice, which requires a holistic approach and response by the Church” (Synod). So HIV-AIDS, neither most important nor negligible, takes its place amidst the great challenges and inter-related problems facing Africa.
Whoever has seen the sun before you, passes the light of life to you.
Our African family is a seamless community binding the living and the not-yet-born and the living dead who have gone before. So facing AIDS includes the ancestors, and one thing they surely regard is sexuality. Sexuality has always been seen in Africa as morally neutral, neither good nor bad, part of what it means to be human. A comparison is instructive. Fire, if controlled and tamed, is useful in preparing a meal; out of control, it can burn the roof and consume the whole house. Likewise, sexuality needs to be channelled and disciplined so that its life-giving potential is fulfilled and its destructiveness curbed. Both our traditional African cultures and our way of life as Christians give norms for living out one’s sexuality for the long-term good of everyone.
That’s not how everyone sees it, of course. The Church’s understanding of sexuality is often scorned for being rigid, unrealistic or moralistic. Some think that the fire should rage free and untamed, even in the face of AIDS. This can be a seductive message for younger members of our family who are just discovering their sexuality and for older ones, too. But in truth many seek guidance on how to live it in a healthy way. So it is very important for the Church to get her life-affirming message across today to everyone. Abstinence and fidelity are not only the best ways to avoid HIV and tackle AIDS, but are the path to real, personal fulfilment. Honest moral education encourages a healthy approach to relationships and to sexuality based on respect and love for others. In particular, unmarried young people who would like to practice sexual abstinence before marriage – probably a significant majority among Christians and Muslims and even in society as a whole – need the Church to form and care for them pastorally and stand up for them in public.
Fire that is surrounded by elders cannot burn you.
Within our family, couples who are discordant or doubly-infected face a particularly difficult situation. They deserve “pastoral support which informs and forms their consciences, so that they might choose what is right, with full responsibility for the greater good of each other, their union and their family” (Synod). Jesuit pastors and counsellors should be ready to accompany them sensitively, help them with formation and information, and support them in their fidelity.
Besides sexuality, there are other important causes which fuel the spread of HIV. Thousands of people, for example, are infected because of poverty, hunger, war and forced displacement, domestic violence and the sex trade. Thus, sin wreaks destruction, hurts our brothers and sisters, and weighs heavily on us all. Anyone who wants to understand how HIV-AIDS impact on human life must consider economics, politics, society and culture, as well as the more immediate personal and family issues.
AIDS cuts across all the disciplines which promote social justice in Africa. Many Church programmes, including ours, fight for access to comprehensive care treatment, with testing, medication for opportunistic infections, food and support to earn a living. The aim is to live like a family: to respect the dignity and life of each one, to show solidarity with anyone in need.
One finger can’t do all the work.
We should not be afraid of, less still be discouraged, by the enormity of the problems of our continent among which HIV and AIDS. It is part of life and will be for a long time to come. As a great family, we face the challenge confidently. We plead for sustained support to meet the needs of many for assistance. We know that our all-provident Father is at our side. This faith gives us compassion and perseverance.
An army of well organised ants can bring down an elephant.
Like Jesus, Mary and Joseph in the Holy Family, so the Church-Family of God in Africa knows her sons and daughters, their needs, strengths and weaknesses, fears and hopes. She manifests this loving knowledge in her familiar ways of preventing HIV and caring for the sick and for those affected by AIDS, working for reconciliation, justice and peace. With the Synod, JESAM thanks all those who are generously involved in this difficult apostolate of love and care.
Fratern Masawe SJ
JESAM Moderator Karen, 1 December 2009
|
|
|
|
|
