Forward with faith and fervour - FBOs in Action

Furthering the ongoing dialogue within the WCRP/HIVAN Forum Series between faith-based organisations and HIV/AIDS researchers, the evening of the 6th May 2003 drew together a comprehensive interfaith panel of speakers in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, to share updates on their respective HIV/AIDS intervention strategies.

From the outset, it was clear that the presentations would not focus on passive reflection and quiet contemplations on the issues and implications of the pandemic for this diverse range of congregant communities. Instead, the depth and breadth of the practical activities described by the panellists and being undertaken across a geographic spread of communities covering almost every corner of South Africa was remarkable.

Talking against the constraints of the clock that typically govern meetings of this nature, the speakers forged through their reports on national, provincial and community-level HIV/AIDS training, care and support programmes being implemented by their teams. Projects being conducted by the Muslim AIDS Programme (MAP), the Diakonia Council of Churches, the Buddhist Retreat Centre at Ixopo in KZN, the Tikkun Jewish initiative, the World Conference on Religion and Peace (WCRP), the Sinikithemba Christian Care Centre at Durban's McCord Hospital, the Ba-Hai Faith community, Positive Muslims and the Durban Catholic Archdiocese were summarised.

Most, if not all, of these programmes incorporate services such as skills development, psycho-spiritual counselling, lobbying against stigma and discrimination, parenting classes and family focus groups, fundraising, volunteer co-ordination, training materials, awareness events, exposure visits, networking fora, orphan support, social grants access assistance, income generation and micro-enterprise initiatives, stress management, building of infrastructure and facilities, peer education and community mobilisation.

Several of the FBOs offer help with voluntary testing and counselling, DOTS therapy for TB patients and other medical interventions, whether clinical or palliative. To a considerable degree, their volunteers are engaged, with unflinching devotion, in the basic and most demanding care-work of all: tending to the terminally ill in desperately poor home settings. The Positive Muslims set an impressive example of unconditional love and respect by extending this level of service to washing and preparing the bodies of the deceased for burial; (this has been necessary in cases wherein orthodox community and family members have rejected the task in favour of "hosing them down", as HIV/AIDS has rendered them "untouchable").

Care of the care-givers is also not neglected. Both Clare Kerry of WorldVision SA and Barbara Miller from the Tikkun organisation reported that psycho-spiritual "supervision" (or debriefing) and support group gatherings for occupational "burn-out" are offered to their volunteers. Similarly, the Sinikithemba Centre runs regular bereavement and trauma counselling group sessions, while Tikkun and the Diakonia Council arrange recreational outings and retreats for their teams, and the Catholic Archdiocese offers material and emotional support to both adult and young care-givers.

During question-time, discussion revolved around how to deal with the traumatic effects of so much death and illness on young community members, particularly those orphaned by AIDS. Professor Phillipe Denis from the University of KwaZulu-Natal's School of Theology in Pietermaritzburg spoke of the Memory Box Project, initiated jointly with the Catholic Sinosizo programme in the KZN Midlands region some years before. This unique research and intervention programme was proving highly effective in assisting orphans of HIV/AIDS to cope with grief and the dissolution of their family and community frameworks. (For more information on the Memory Box Project, click on the link in the righthand column)

A Kenyan member of the African FBO Forum asked about the fate of orphans in institutions who reached the age of 18 and could no longer depend on the orphanage for shelter. Paddy Meskin of the WCRP explained that a number of such institutions were creating "family systems" from within, so that many of these young adults could become professional or qualified lay caregivers if alternative domestic and career options were limited.

The "FBOs in Action" Forum was a composite revelation of how faith communities are forming truly constructive partnerships and creative responses to confront the HIV/AIDS epidemic, opening their hearts, minds and homes to those in need without fear or favour.

In a society moving slowly on the path of recovery from historically legislated fragmentation, these coalitions are proving that holistic approaches and a shared vision of renewal and reconciliation are not only possible, but are vital in facing down the HIV/AIDS pandemic.