community groups 

Camilla Symes was involved with the Barnabas Trust in South Africa, which works for behavioural change and family life as part of the front line fight against HIV/AIDS. It supports community groups by producing manuals and training people working in church-based AIDS programmes. It runs Mothers’ Union community-based orphan and vulnerable child care programmes in 19 parishes, and is looking for wider influence among secular NGOs and government departments. Their prayer is that Christ would be glorified as groups of Christians are enabled to give care to those suffering from AIDS

Camilla comments: “A third of girls of fifteen may die before 35. One day my grandchildren may ask me what I did about it. Even if they don’t, I know from Matthew 25 that Christ expects me to be involved. The people dying around me daily need love and care and to hear that they have hope of eternal life and how to get it. These people need to hear and accept the Gospel. And when Christians get involved with helping the needy, this is a witness to rich and poor alike about the message and character of Christ.”. 

social work 

Sadly HIV/AIDS touches all that Dean and Paula Finnie do in Chris Nissen Park in South Africa. Most households in the community are affected and the Finnies spend much of their time visiting and praying with the sick, and helping practically with wider family issues. Many of the people are still in denial about their status and are therefore not receiving correct medical care. Dean has made very good relationships with the local ARV clinic and they are involved with training people in home-based care.  

masters course

John and Rena Downing have developed the MA Programme in Community Care and HIV/AIDS at St Paul’s United Theological Seminary in Kenya, and the first graduates receive their degrees this October. 1,400 volunteers were trained by 74 students from the first three intakes and they are responding to the AIDS epidemic in practical and spiritual ways. So far the programme has touched the lives of 30,000 Kenyans affected by HIV/AIDS – all through believers sharing the love of God and bringing the churches into the forefront of the care and education regimes taking place in villages and informal settlements.

young people

A fifth of all young people in Lilongwe, Malawi are infected with HIV. Caroline Maclean’s team of Christian youth workers encourage behaviour change through schools, churches and peer education. Karen Salmon and her colleague Raphael from the Mekelle Youth Centre in Ethiopia teach young people at orphanages, schools and training centres. After learning HIV /AIDS Awareness in Orthodox seminaries, former students are now going into the prisons with Karen. She also has weekly meetings with young prisoners who have HIV and at least two have come to know the Lord Jesus. As one worker said, “There is no cure for AIDS but a saving faith in Jesus Christ gives hope for the future.”   

  Crosslinks magazine October 2006 index