On a crisp 41-degree morning, more than a hundred people gathered beneath the AIDS Memorial in Greenwich Village to mark World AIDS Day, observed every Dec. 1 since 1988. The memorial — an 18-foot white steel canopy built in 2016…
Supreme Court says ACA can continue to provide HIV-prevention meds
The Affordable Care Act will continue to provide free preventative services and medications to millions of people who rely on that provision of the law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled June 27. The 6-3 decision in Secretary of Health and…
Among Christian ministries, two opposing views of Trump’s sudden, chaotic aid cuts
Evangelicals were essential in reelecting Donald Trump. Now, his sudden and drastic cuts to aid programs are forcing some evangelical nonprofits to end work and fire personnel, while Focus on the Family and other conservative groups praise the aid cuts…
What happened to Saddleback’s PEACE Plan?
Rick and Kay Warren gave an excellent interview to Krista Tippett, on the On Being radio show almost 20 years ago, on Dec. 6, 2007. In it, Pastor Rick says this: The reason there are hungry people in the world,…
‘The due penalty of their error’
I have often sat with my older LGBTQ friends and heard their stories of terror and loss during the AIDS crisis of the 1980s and ’90s. This disease spread throughout the LGBTQ community like wildfire, while many leaders in both…
Suspending PEPFAR: An emergency of our own making
I recently watched a war movie in which the threat of “friendly fire” hung over soldiers on the front lines. Those behind the lines would lob shells that took out people on their side, decimating and demoralizing the troops.
Dispelling myths about HIV/AIDS is part of this center’s faith calling
Major stereotypes about HIV/AIDS and its victims persist despite decades of advancements in the knowledge and treatment of the virus and disease, said Stacy W. Smallwood, new executive director of the Faith COMPASS Center at Wake Forest University Divinity School….
Searching for Grace: Haunting question
This is the fourth of a five-part fictional story set in the early 1990s about Rev. Paul Graham and his congregation, Grace United Church of Christ. In the previous episode, a lifelong member of Paul’s congregation contracted HIV/AIDS. In spite…
Searching for Grace: Worst-kept secret
This is the third of a five-part fictional story set in the early 1990s about Paul Graham and his congregation, Grace United Church of Christ. Previously, Paul made the difficult but necessary decision to leave the Southern Baptist Convention and…
They lost me when they said this was not a letter about AIDS
Back in the 1980s when the world was still trying to figure out how to get a handle on the pandemic of AIDS, I came home from work one day and had a letter from the American Red Cross. I…