The pastor at the Southern Baptist Convention’s largest church used a conference timed to conclude on World AIDS Day to announce a new commitment to caring for the millions of people infected with HIV and AIDS.
Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Community Church and best-selling author of The Purpose-Driven Life, hosted nearly 1,700 senior pastors from evangelical churches nationwide on Nov. 21-Dec. 1 for a conference on AIDS called “Disturbing Voices.”
Warren, who admitted most evangelicals have been on the wrong side of the AIDS issue, said ministering to those suffering with AIDS is another responsibility Christians must take seriously.
“The church has the moral authority to say, ‘Hey, it’s not a sin to be sick,’ ” said Warren. “The Gospels repeatedly show that Jesus loved, touched, and cared for lepers—the diseased outcasts of his day. Today’s ‘lepers’ are those who have HIV/AIDS.”
Warren earlier this year announced his “PEACE Plan” for changing the focus and structure of international Christian involvement (PEACE stands for Planting churches, Equipping leaders, Assisting the poor, Caring for the sick and Educating the next generation).
Throughout the conference, Warren encouraged attending pastors to establish volunteer groups to help care for those suffering with HIV and to offer free counseling and HIV testing at their own churches. Warren said it was his wife, Kay, who helped focus his attention on the plight of those living with AIDS. She delivered one of the keynote addresses at the meeting.
“The evangelical church has pretty much had fingers in our ears, hands over our eyes and mouths shut completely,” said Kay Warren. “We’re not comfortable talking about sex in general and certainly not comfortable about talking about homosexuality—and you can’t talk about HIV without talking about both of those things.”
According to an Associated Press report, the conference received measured appreciation from those who have fought for years in the AIDS battle. Harry Knox, director of the religion and faith program at the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, said he welcomed the outreach as long as it wasn’t judgmental.
“For far too long, many radical-right pastors have mischaracterized the disease for their own political purposes and we have reaped the unfortunate reward of that misinformation,” he said. “It is good news that evangelicals are now embracing people with HIV and AIDS to help us get our needs met.”
Other speakers at the conference included Bill Hybels, senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church in suburban Chicago. Medical experts and other leaders in the AIDS community also spoke.
This year’s World AIDS Day theme was “Stop AIDS: Keep the Promise.” World AIDS Day began in 1988 following the first international health summit that met in London to address the issue from a global viewpoint. According to the Joint United Nations Program on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS), there are 38 million adults and 2.3 million children living with HIV worldwide. Some 4.9 million people will become infected with the virus in 2005.
Associated Baptist Press