Aids Kills Conscience Church Attitude Needs Revival After Family With Aids Shunned

Another life was lost to AIDS.

It’s not a new story. Since 1980, approximately 480,000 cases of AIDS have been diagnosed nationwide, but not enough people seem to think it matters.

Moreover, about 296,000 of those infected have died. This time, however, it was a 12-year-old boy, Matthew Allen, who died. His grandfather, the Rev. Jimmy Allen, was formerly head of the Southern Baptist Convention. And the support all of them desperately needed from their church family never materialized.

“We found no shelter in the Christian community,” Jimmy Allen said in a news conference this week.

Last month, as death was near for Matthew, Allen refrained from bitterness.

“I’m not mad at God,” he said. “I’m sad because the family of faith is dysfunctional and needs serious change.”

In his new book “Burden of a Secret: A Story of Truth and Mercy in the Face of AIDS” (Moorings, $17.99), Allen recounts the spiritual family breakdown that started in 1985 when Allen’s daughter-in-law, Lydia Allen, discovered she had contracted AIDS from a blood transfusion during her pregnancy with Matthew. The virus was also passed on to her second child, Bryan, before the tainted blood was discovered.

Scott Allen, husband and father, immediately looked for support from his church family in Colorado Springs, Colo. He was stunned by the church’s reaction: He was fired as minister of education. In addition, his son, Matthew, was removed from the church’s day care, and the entire family was told to find another church.

Moving to Fort Worth to live with his parents, Jimmy and Wanda Allen, Scott and his family again found little church support. Each one they visited turned them away once they learned about the family’s disease. These were good churches with upstanding preachers, Jimmy Allen writes. His pleas to leaders he had mentored were rebuffed. Churchgoers might stay away, they responded; prospects might never visit. (In fairness, Allen said this week that these churches now have active AIDS programs.)

In 1986, Bryan died. In 1992, Lydia died. And last week, Matthew died. All the deaths were from AIDS-related causes.

Because the church rejected Scott Allen and his family, Scott Allen rejected the church. He is now exploring Eastern religions.

It’s a sad commentary on what churches claim to be a hospital for sinners, a refuge for the weary, a place of hope for the forsaken. But for those with AIDS? A lot of closed doors. At least in some churches.

Thankfully, others have responded. Less than two weeks after the first AIDS case was diagnosed in 1981, an Episcopal group in California called Parsonage was organized to provide education about AIDS to local churches.

In 1987, 10 Protestant and Jewish groups met to coordinate their educational programs to fight AIDS discrimination. Since then, other national as well as local religious groups have followed suit.

But, as the Allen story shows, churches still have a long way to go in changing attitudes about the disease and about those who are afflicted.

Friday, Dec. 1, is World AIDS Day. Events are planned in the United States and other countries to raise awareness of this disease’s devastating effects. Obviously a lot of misinformation about how people contract the disease and a lot of hateful prejudice against those with AIDS still abounds. Sad to say, many churches’ words of compassion don’t match their deeds of love.

With World AIDS Day upon us, now would be a good time for all religious groups to consider the suggestions of Jimmy Allen:

Learn about the disease and its effects. That also means abandoning the “leave-it-to-the-Samaritan complex.” As Allen rightly notes: Shouldn’t the first to mount the parapets of this battle be “the followers of the One who told that Samaritan story”?

Preachers need to talk about AIDS from the pulpit or invite a guest speaker who’s knowledgeable about it. “Many faithful people in our congregations yearn to ask for prayer for AIDS-related needs in their lives, or in the lives of friends,” writes Allen, “but they are afraid to do so.”

And all of us need to reach out to those with AIDS and to their families. “Simply being there for an AIDS victim and family members,” writes Allen, “may be the most powerful ministry we have.”

No doubt talking about AIDS will be difficult for many churches. Some will only blame and judge. But to do either ignores the greater issue: to help the hurting is a biblical mandate.

Sadly, too many churches failed Matthew Allen, Lydia Allen and Bryan Allen. But their deaths may yet have a profound, positive effect. In dying, they may stir the consciences of believers and revive the family of faith, teaching all of us how to care for those with AIDS.

MEMO: Tom Schaefer writes about religion and ethics for the Wichita (Kan.) Eagle. Write to him at the Wichita Eagle, P.O. Box 820, Wichita, KS 67201.