MCC couple reports on families at risk in Africa AIDS crisis

Mennonite Central Committee
Monday, 23 July 2001

AKRON, Pa. -- Sometimes big numbers can be overwhelming. When it comes to HIV/AIDS, infection rates and deaths in the millions are hard to grasp. In sub-Saharan Africa, more than 25 million people are HIV positive. Two and one-half million people there have died from AIDS. Millions of children have lost parents to the disease.

Listening to the stories of Stan and Delores Friesen who recently visited Africa for Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), one begins to get a sense of the human scale of this ever-widening tragedy.

More than 300 street children, orphaned by AIDS, live under a bridge in Lusaka, Zambia. At night the girls and youngest boys sleep in the middle for safety. Bigger children look out for the smaller ones.

Sam, a retired Ugandan man concerned for street children, began taking boys into his home. Soon a group of girls arrived and asked for help. Today, with the help of a small grant from MCC's Global Family Program, he is caring for 74 children.

A woman named Maggie told the Friesens she chose to remain single because of the risk of infection, an unusual choice in Africa, but one becoming more common. "I can only be sure of my own behavior," she explained. "I cannot be sure of anyone else's." Earlier in life she wanted a husband and children but has now decided to take that need for love and use it to help others who are suffering. Maggie now works in the dietary department of a mission hospital.

The Friesens, both teachers and pastoral counselors, traveled to 10 African countries this spring on an AIDS information gathering trip for MCC. They visited churches, hospitals, non-governmental organizations and families gathering information on needs related to HIV/AIDS and possibilities for further MCC involvement.

Despite the enormous toll of HIV/AIDS in Africa, the devastation isn't visible everywhere, say the Friesens. "You have to look in the cemeteries -- at row on row of new graves with birth dates in the 1960s, 1970s and more recent ones," says Delores. "In Kampala [Uganda] a whole street of carpenters is making caskets. In Botswana huge funeral parlors are being built."

As in the West, AIDS has forced churches in Africa to deal with theological issues of sexuality, death and suffering. Church communities and families are stressed. Most diseases affect the weak, Delores notes, but AIDS takes the strongest and most productive first, the people of working and childbearing years, age 15 to 40. Older people and children must then carry on with the farming or other work. Grandparents often care for orphaned children, but their eventual death leaves children without support.

What can churches and church agencies do?

Africa's health crisis has ripple effects -- it is also a moral, ethical and socioeconomic crisis, the Friesens point out. Loss of income, coupled with medical and funeral expenses, destroys family and community resources for the future. Like their counterparts in North America, many African churches find it hard to respond to the crisis, partly because frank discussions of sexual issues are difficult.

But African churches are also the strongest source of hope, say the Friesens. "Many people are finding a new kind of wholeness within the life of the church though they have the disease," says Delores. Through the church, people find strength in their faith or come to faith. The church's structure, resources and ability to work across generations give it a unique power to help those in need, Stan says.

This is a moment for Christians around the world to become one family of God, says Delores. "Every life is precious." When visiting dying people in their homes, Friesens found Muslims, Christians, and people who practice traditional religion were equally grateful for someone to visit and pray with them or read scripture. "Tell God I've suffered enough," a Muslim man told them.

Stan notes the difference between the AIDS crisis and the January earthquake in Gujarat, India. "This earthquake [AIDS] will be rumbling for years. The challenge for the church will be responding with endurance, compassion and vision for the long haul."

The Friesens believe MCC and Mennonite mission boards can work together to respond. Church leaders and church partners in Africa are asking for training for counseling on bereavement, shame, reconciliation and forgiveness -- "this is a tremendous pastoral challenge," says Stan.

Individuals and churches elsewhere can contribute, too, Friesens say. While much discussion centers around drug availability, simple things like plastic gloves are out of reach for many people providing home care for patients. Economic effects of AIDS mean more and more children are receiving no education. If every family in a church made a long-term commitment to contribute to a child's education through sponsorship programs like MCC's Global Family Program, the overall effect would be great, Delores says.

African churches are responding simply yet effectively. In one area, churches help AIDS sufferers to plant two fruit trees, which will provide food, underscore the importance of good nutrition, show care and also provide for the patient's family after death. In another church, every member brings a cup of any food staple purchased during the week -- salt, rice, oil -- for distribution to the hungry. "Wouldn't it be wonderful if North American churches could do something similar?" asks Delores.

For more information, or to contact Mennonite Central Committee, see their website at: www.mcc.org