Lausanne World Pulse – LAUSANNE REPORTS – Mission through the Lens of AIDS
By Evvy Campbell
December 2010
Urbana 06 attendees had the opportunity to step into AIDS in Africa through an interactive exhibit in which they received the identity of someone in Africa together with headphones and an MP3-player to listen to that person’s life story. Progressing through rooms of a hut with dirt and hay on the floor, and confronted with stirring photography and compelling stories, the experience culminated with participants having their hands stamped either HIV-positive or negative. With nearly forty percent of the population of Botswana and Swaziland infected with HIV, the exhibit, hosted by James Pedrick and his Acting on AIDS colleagues at World Vision, provided a haunting simulation of the lives of Africans living with AIDS. World Vision also provided three thousand free copies of a comprehensive and instructive DVD, “Acting on AIDS Toolkit,” to help students develop their own campus programs.
Through the Lens of AIDS and Beyond
The 5 January 2007 Wall Street Journal rightly reported of Urbana 06 that “a big focus of the program this year was the AIDS epidemic and the ways that Christians can respond to it.”
In addition to the residential track on AIDS, an extended evening session for all delegates featured Kay Warren of Saddleback Church’s (Lake Forest, California, USA) HIV/AIDS Initiative, and Princess Kasune Zulu representing the voices of those living with AIDS. Zulu’s sister, mother and father all died of AIDS. At a young age, Zulu began caring for those with AIDS at a local hospital in her native Zambia. She married an older man who had already lost two wives to AIDS. Now HIV-positive herself, Zulu has hitch-hiked across Zambia to make high-risk truck drivers aware of AIDS prevention methods, hosted a national radio program on AIDS and travels internationally speaking on behalf of AIDS orphans and girls forced into the sex trade to provide for their younger siblings. Half of the twelve agencies receiving portions of the $1.2 million Urbana 06 conference offering, including IFES (International Fellowship of Evangelical Students), MAP International, Serving In Mission, World Relief and World Vision, have AIDS initiatives.
Why Should I Care?
Affy Adeleye of Nigeria, who led a seminar on “Speaking on Campuses about AIDS and the Gospel,” said that some attendees, many personally untouched by the pandemic, came to the conference still asking, “Why should I care?” In contrast, a Kenyan student studying in the United States confided to track co-leader Grace Tazelaar that she was questioning her faith in God because, “It doesn’t seem fair. The United States is so blessed, yet the people of Kenya are so poor and suffering with AIDS.”
The prayers, planning, Bible studies, sacrificial meal and programmatic efforts of “Mission through the Lens of AIDS” were conceived from the passion that no Urbana 06 attendee leave with the first question unanswered and that many would feel compelled to stand alongside those like their Kenyan sister who have tasted the grief of the pandemic. Tazelaar urged the Kenyan student to “hang onto the faith that you have been given. Maybe God has a calling on your life for Kenya and that is why you are here.” Indeed, that many would heed the call to respond to HIV/AIDS was a deep part of the heartbeat of Urbana 06. It is part of living a life worthy of the calling.
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Dr. Evvy Hay Campbell is chair of intercultural studies at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, USA, and was facilitator of the 2004 Forum for World Evangelization Holistic Mission Issue Group. She is Lausanne senior associate for holistic mission. |
