Special Moment - World AIDS Day 2009

We marked World AIDS Day on the 1st December with a special exhibition at St Nicolas’ Church. Displays on the theme of HOPE – Healing, Orphans, Prejudice and Education helped people to engage with the people behind the headlines, the 33 million people here and overseas who are living with HIV.

A particular highlight was the visit of all the Year 6 (10/11 year old) children in the Parish into Church to look around and make their own response. They were engaged and positive as they looked and asked questions. Their teachers were delighted with the visit.

Another highlight was the testimony of Miranda at an evening event on the 1st December. It is reproduced here with her permission:
 

“Neil bases this annual event around the acronym HOPE. It’s a good one, for without the hope, dedication, determination and courage of a few pioneering doctors, nurses and scientists and a heart-breaking number of young men, many of the 33 million people living with HIV or AIDs today would be dead.

20 years ago hope was fighting fear and prejudice, and losing.

My friends were dying from rare and frightening diseases. The word was you got AIDs if you shared knives, cups, towels, even seats or handshakes and most weeks there was at least one place empty at the bar or the bus stop.

20 years ago pioneering researchers correctly identified the origin of the virus and predicted a pandemic affecting 20 million people. They were discredited! 20 years later we know them to have been right.

20 years ago sick young men were rejected by their families, their friends and their church. It was ‘all their own fault’! They lost their jobs, their homes, their GPs, their dentists. They trialled risky new treatments with devastating side effects in the hope of a cure.

Full blown AIDs is a shocking thing to witness. John lost his sight, Peter his mind.

I remember a 14 year old lad dying without understanding why or what from

I remember a birthday party on a bus during a raging storm. All the guests were dying. We had chocolate cake.

I remember a vicar too frightened to shake my hand or sit beside me

I remember a feeling of hopelessness

5 years ago I met Neil and saw the church reaching out to those affected by HIV and AIDs instead of condemning them. Things had moved on.

2 years ago I met Lesley. 20 years ago when she had nursed my friends as they lay dying on her ward I had not known her.

Today my friends are outpatients. Their meds are still complex and the regime is punishing but their life expectancy is good. Their children are being born free of the virus and across the world the infection rate is slowing. There is still no cure but research is moving forward all the time.

20 years ago hope was fighting fear and prejudice, and losing

Today hope is fighting fear and prejudice, and winning”

Special Moments Archive:

Remembrance Sunday 2009   Parish Prayer Walk 2009  
Harvest Festival 2008   Set All Free   Equiano Exhibition   Jubilee Slideshow  
Pentecost 2006   Confirmation at St Peter's   Visit of Bishop Steven