Not my God: Reclaiming faith from HIV stigma
Revd Cate Jacobs speaking at the World AIDS Day vigil at Liverpool Parish Church, with a British Sign Language interpreter signing.
“I slowly found my way back to a place of belonging within a church, where I could be all of me. Where I could breathe again without fear of discovery, or stigma.”
ON WORLD AIDS DAY, 1st December, since 1988, communities across the globe have come together to show strength and solidarity against HIV stigma and to remember lives lost to the HIV pandemic.
At this year’s vigil in Liverpool hosted by Sahir, the region’s largest and oldest HIV charity, Revd Cate Jacobs, the first HIV-positive woman to be ordained as a priest in the Church of England, shared this reflection on the role of faith in both causing stigma around HIV and challenging it.
In 1993 world-renowned evangelist Billy Graham was the main speaker at a crusade in Columbus Ohio, when one of the members of the audience asked him:
‘Is AIDS a judgement from God?’
His reply to this question was:
’I cannot be sure, but I think so.’
He later retracted this statement, but the damage was done, and nearly 30 years later we are still living under the shadow of that condemnation.
The right-wing conservative element of the church repeatedly claimed that AIDS was a punishment from God - and used the issue of HIV/AIDS in their pernicious campaign against the gay community. It backfired of course, not least because HIV is an issue that affects us all, no matter our race, sexuality, or gender identity.
Statements and claims like these, from ministers of the church, alienated great swathes of people of faith, across different religions and cultures, who had been diagnosed with HIV. It left many of them isolated, victims of some of the worst prejudices of our times, that sadly are still pertinent for many today.
There can be nothing worse than believing that a supposedly loving God would reject and condemn you for catching a disease. So people sat silently in the pews, and still do, if they sit here at all. The damage of those early messages still resonates today.
But thankfully the churches and people who adhere to a prejudicial theology are NOT the whole picture.
At the very beginning of the HIV epidemic a group of priests from the Passionist order responded by becoming what we would later call ‘buddies’, offering practical and social support to HIV positive people.
Mildmay Mission Hospital was one of few places in the early days that offered good hospital and hospice care to patients with AIDS, a place famously visited many times by Princess Diana, who had a real commitment to reducing stigma and prejudice for people living with HIV globally.
Father John Sherrington, a Passionist priest, was for many years priest to the Positive Faith community that arose to serve the spiritual needs of HIV positive Christians in the UK.
Shallowford House, a Christian retreat centre in Stafford, used to host the long-term survivor’s retreat.
And of course, the wonderful Father Kevin Kelly was a patron and supporter of Sahir House until his death. He was remarkable man and a great theologian, and I was lucky to call him friend; he was pivotal in my own faith journey, which eventually led me to being ordained.
You see, when I heard the message: ‘AIDS is a punishment from God’, my first thought was ‘not my God’, and I left the church - it seemed to be no place for a young woman who had been diagnosed with HIV, and who’s partner was dying of AIDS.
So you might well ask how I ended up here!
I have always believed in the radical message of love, that Jesus preached - I believed that when he said love one another as I have loved you - there were no if’s, or but’s, or ‘only if you can tick these boxes’ - he actually meant you and me. And not ‘even if’ you have HIV, but especially because you have HIV, Jesus’ invitation was and is: come as you are… ironically the slogan of Open Table!
Open Table is an ecumenical Christian charity that serves the LGBT+ Christian community. It’s the fastest growing fresh expression of church in our country today with 39 communities across England and Wales.
Bishop Paul Bayes, himself a former patron of Liverpool’s Pride charity, called Open Table a movement and supported us whole heartedly.
It was through the Open Table community at St Bride’s in Liverpool that I slowly found my way back to a place of belonging within a church, where I could be all of me. Where I could breathe again without fear of discovery, or stigma.
And after 30 years of activism in the field of HIV, as a public speaker, change worker, HIV columnist, writer and poet, I was ready to hang up my boots - except I realised that the last bastion of prejudice; both for HIV positive people, and the LGBT+ communities, was the church.
