July 19, 2010

A multi-faith meeting on the eve of the 18th International AIDS Conference in Vienna has heard calls for faith communities to keep commitments they have made to promote universal access to HIV treatment, care, support and prevention.

"This has to do with a basic issue of justice, not at least gender justice," the general secretary of the World Council of Churches, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, said in an address to the 17 July multi-faith conference at Vienna's Technical University.

The conference gathered more than 250 people, including leaders of religious groups, networks of people living with HIV and international organizations, under the theme, "Rights Here, Right Now: What's faith got to do with it?"

Tveit was part of an opening panel looking at how faith traditions promote work towards universal access to HIV treatment, care, support and prevention.

He recalled that back in 1987 the main governing body of the WCC had affirmed the "right to medical and pastoral care regardless of socio-economic status, race, sex, sexual orientation or sexual relationship."

"We should keep our commitments to do what we know we have to do," said Tveit.

Leadership by faith communities in the struggle against HIV and AIDS, "doesn't come just like that," said Hany El Banna, the Egyptian-born founder and former president of Islamic Relief. "It comes with responsibility."

Faith communities, he said, are able to mobilize people at the "grass roots," in mosques, churches, synagogues and temples.

"We shouldn't be afraid of religion," El Banna stated. "We should be afraid of ignorance and a lack of knowledge."

The International AIDS Conference is held every two years and draws more than 20,000 medical professionals and scientists, policy makers, persons living with HIV, and others working in the field of HIV and AIDS. In 2010 it runs from 18 to 23 July.

Jan Beagle, the deputy director of UNAIDS, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, said faith communities can help bridge a "disconnect" between the scientific world and the world of culture, religion and communities.

"We are not asking religious leaders to hand out condoms, unless that is acceptable within your traditions, but to partner with us in approaches to HIV prevention education, health care and referral," she said.

Beagle called for an end to "punitive laws" that criminalize men who have sex with men, sex workers and their clients, and people who inject drugs.

"We hear the framing of ‘innocent and guilty' returning to public debate," she said. Such language, she warned, is an "affront to universal human rights," and risks driving underground those most at risk for fear of isolation and institutional injustice.

WCC general secretary Tveit in his address said faith leaders need to exercise care in the way they use religious language and writings. This means, "not only being accountable about what pieces of our faith texts we quote but how we use these text."

Prudence Mabele, who in 1992 became the first black woman in South Africa publicly to reveal her HIV-positive status, said in her society, traditional healers offer care "holistically" to people with HIV.

"We deal with the spiritual guidance and the emotional life of a human being," said Mabele, the founder and executive director of Positive Women's Network, who provides support to women living with HIV in South Africa.

Mabele recalled how she became aware of her gift as a healer when she was 8 years old, but at first tried to renounce it. It was when she discovered at the age of 19 that she had been infected with HIV she "accepted her calling."

Traditional healers, Mabele said, work closely with doctors and medical professionals, and she criticised healers "who have promised false cures."

Mabele recounted how traditional healers see the barriers that people with HIV face when they seek treatment. "They don't have food. They don't have the money to pay for the most simple service," she said.

The multi-faith conference began with songs from the Zimbabwean Betseranai Choir, made up of about 20 people living with HIV, which uses music and songs to mobilize people in the struggle against AIDS.

The conference was organized by a multi-faith working group convened by the Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance, an international network of churches and church-related organizations.

"The world expects people of faith to be working together, said Richard Fee, the alliance's chairperson. "We have recognized that and it is time we started doing that."

More information about faith-based advocacy at the International AIDS Conference: http://www.oikoumene.org/index.php?id=2267&rid=f_13684&mid=2406&aC=63bab3c8&jumpurl=1.

WCC work for an HIV-competent church: http://www.oikoumene.org/index.php?id=2267&rid=f_13684&mid=2406&aC=63bab3c8&jumpurl=2.

World Council of Churches
Stephen Brown reported from Vienna.