HIV-AIDS – Communio

Vatican archbishop speaks to issues regarding HIV/AIDS on World AIDS Day 2011

We honor with fraternal solidarity and spiritual closeness those who faithfully and sensitively observe World AIDS Day 2011. Not many have been unaffected by HIV/AIDS: we know someone directly or have been acquainted with someone who has had the devastating disease of HIV/AIDS. I’ve known several people who died due to complications of AIDS or know people who live with the disease today. There’s 33 million people affected by the disease. How can a heart centered on the Lord be unmoved by our brothers and sisters who struggle to live with uncertainty?

Archbishop Zygmunt Zimowski, 62, the President of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, wrote a letter on today’s observance. He notes some good stuff; challenging stuff for some, but things we need to grapple with if we are sincere in our pursuit of truth, goodness and beauty. His thinking in other places has asked for the international community to come together and work on diseases that are pandemic in nature because it is a matter of global security and solidarity. The Archbishop’s letter follows:

Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers

on the Occasion of the World AIDS Day 2011

The World AIDS Day of 2011 must constitute a new opportunity to promote universal access to therapies for those who are infected, the prevention of transmission from mother child, and education in lifestyles that involve, as well, an approach that is truly correct and responsible as regards sexuality. In addition, this is a privileged moment to relaunch the fight against social prejudice and to reaffirm the need for moral, spiritual and – as far as this is possible – material proximity to those who have contracted the infection and to their family relatives.

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World AIDS Day and Pope Benedict

Today’s known as World AIDS Day. The focus of the day is “an opportunity for people worldwide to unite in the fight against HIV, show their support for people living with HIV and to commemorate people who have died. World AIDS Day was the first ever global health day and the first one was held in 1988.” This dreadful disease has claimed many millions of people world-wide –and sex is not always to blame. AND condom use is the answer.

With all the advances in medicine, there are still gaping holes in education and prevention in the fields of medicine, pharmacology, spirituality and society. The recent trip of Pope Benedict to Benin highlighted yet again the need before us. Specifically Benedict called for a holistic response to the AIDS pandemic.

Pope Benedict stated:

The problem of AIDS,in particular,clearly calls for a medical and pharmaceutical response. This is not enough, however: the problem goes deeper. Above all, it is an ethical problem. The change of behavior that it requires -for example, sexual abstinence, rejection of sexual promiscuity, fidelity within marriage- ultimately involves the question of integral development,which demands a global approach and a global response from the Church. For if it is to be effective, the prevention of AIDS must be based on a sex education that is itself grounded in an anthropology anchored in the natural law and enlightened by the word of God and the Church’s teaching.

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Vatican and Good Samaritan Foundation talk on AIDS

Stats for those living with HIV-AIDS is somewhere around 33 million, records the World Health Organization (WHO). Recently, the HIV-AIDS epidemic was studied at a Rome conference hosted by the Holy See and the Good Samaritan Foundation. The conference was titled “The Centrality of Care for the Person in the Prevention and Treatment of Illnesses caused by HIV and AIDS.”

Various experts and Vatican officials, including the Pope’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, where he said that our work ought to be centered on the patient in way that a holistic approach is followed: the whol person and not only the disease needs to competent assistance and friendship. Experts from 26 countries attended the conference.

It is estimated that there are some thing like 117,000 health centers across the globe that treat AIDS patients. With all the money wasted on frivolous things, the WHO said their research revealed that in 2009 about $16 million was used for AIDS research and treatments. Problems exist in medical care and safety because only 35 percent of patients in third world countries have access to treatment. Do the math: roughly 10 million people don’t have access to any type of medication and proper health care.

Prayer for Those Who Suffer with HIV, AIDS

God of our
weary years, God of our silent tears, O Good and gracious God, you are the God
of health and wholeness.

In the plan of your creation, you call us to struggle
in our sickness and to cling always to the cross of your Son. Father, we are
your servants. Many of us are now suffering with HIV or AIDS.

We come before
you, and ask you, if it is your holy will, to take away this suffering from us,
to restore us to health and to lead us to know you and your powerful healing,
love of body and spirit.

We ask you also to be with those of us who nurse your
sick ones. We are the mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, and friends
of your suffering people. It is so hard for us to see those whom we love
suffer. You know what it is to suffer. Help us to minister in loving care, support,
and patience to your people who suffer with HIV and AIDS.

Lead us to do
whatever it will take to eradicate this illness from the lives of those who are
touched by it, both directly and indirectly. Trusting in you and the strength
of your Spirit, we pray these things in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Pope calls for prayers and care for those living with HIV/AIDS

This coming December 1 the World AIDS Day will be
observed. My thought and my prayer go to all persons affected by this sickness,
in particular children, to the poorest and to those who are rejected. The
Church does not cease to combat AIDS, through her institutions and the
personnel dedicated to it. I exhort everyone to make their own contribution
with prayer and care, so that those who are affected by the HIV virus will feel
the presence of the Lord who gives support and hope. Finally, I hope that, by
multiplying and coordinating efforts, this sickness will be halted and
eradicated.

Pope Benedict XVI

Sunday Angelus Address

29 November 2009

Vatican City State