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The Black Church and HIV/AIDS

Resources Page

This page has links to onsite and offsite news, features, church statements, and worship resources related to African Americans, the church, and HIV/AIDS.

Onsite News and Features

• The Black Church Week of Prayer 2005.
• The Black Church Week of Prayer 2004.
• Silence on HIV/AIDS Spells Death, Church Leaders Warn, UMNS, December 10, 2002.
• Black Churches Pray for the Healing of AIDS, UMW, February 23, 2001.
• TV Program Will Show Two Cities' Joint Efforts Against AIDS, UMNS, January 4, 2001.

Focus Papers, Statements and Worship Resources

• Worship Resources For World AIDS Day, Healing Services, Personal Devotions...
• The African American Church and the AIDS Crisis by Wesley S. T. Niles (1996)
  Examines some successful models for church ministry and offers a number of worship resources.
• The Council Call: A Commitment on HIV/AIDS by People of Faith (1994)
  Portions of the text of this document were taken, with permission, from The African American Clergy's Declaration of War on HIV/AIDS (The Balm in Gilead Inc., 1994), and from The Atlanta Declaration (AIDS National Interfaith Network, 1989).
• The Black Church and the AIDS Crisis by Mackie H. Norris (1995).
  Looks at this topic in the context of Liberation Theology and the African American Church's historic ministries. Also contains GBGM resolutions on AIDS going to General Conference.
• Recognizing and Responding to the Many Faces of AIDS in the USA
  The United Methodist Church can help to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS through providing sound comprehensive age-appropriate prevention education, including information that abstinence from sex and injection drug use is the safest way to prevent infection.

Offsite News and Features

• One Black Church in Miami Takes A Rocky Journey to Confront AIDS,
• Wall Street Journal, February 14, 2002
• AIDS and the African American Church in the South, Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, Original PBS Broadcast: January 11, 2002.
• Emergency Call: How AIDS Is Hurting Black Communities, Kai Wright Village Voice, June 14-20, 2000.
• African Americans Focus on AIDS Outreach, Christianity Today, April 24, 2000.
• Model AIDS Program Housed in African-American Church, John S. James, AIDS Treatment News, May 7, 1999.

Offsite Resources

• Black Church HIV/AIDS Network (Balm in Gilead).
• The Black Church Week of Prayer (Balm in Gilead).
• Healing Begins Here: A Pastor's Guidebook for HIV/AIDS Ministry Through the Church
  The complete book is available online in PDF format.
• Though I Stand At The Door and Knock: Discussions on the Black Church's Struggle with Homosexuality and AIDS
  Includes the following documents: Homosexuality and the African American Church: The Paradox of the "Open Closet" by Mindy Thompson Fullilove and Robert E. Fullilove, III; The Black Church Beyond Homophobia by Cornel West; Good News For Homosexuals by Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr.; A Message to Black Clergy by Phill Wilson.