world AIDS day

tuesday is world AIDS day and since i probably won't have a chance to blog then, i wanted to share a few thoughts now.

one year ago, i wouldn't have had a clue there even was a world AIDS day. if you had asked me then about AIDS, i probably would have told you i understood it to be a terrible disease that had killed many people. what i wouldn't have been able to tell you is that it is now a survivable disease that can be managed much like any other chronic illness if it's treated with the proper medication. i probably also wouldn't have been able to tell you that almost nobody in africa has access to that medication. OR that almost 12 million children had been orphaned in africa because of AIDS in 2007.

to me, one of the most tragic aspects about the AIDS crisis is that we talk about it so flippantly. how many times have we heard someone say, "oh, it's not like i can solve AIDS in africa." it's like we use the AIDS crisis as some kind of universal metaphor for being unable to do the impossible. perhaps that's really the tragedy...that we think solving AIDS is impossible so we don't think or do much about it. these days, it's become quite offensive to me to hear AIDS talked about in such flippant ways. not many days go by where i don't wonder if today is the day one or both of my children will lose their mother to AIDS. it is a real possibility.

it is difficult to imagine one of my sons sitting by his mother's bedside watching her slowly die of a disease that could have easily been treated. and when i hear people say things like, "AIDS in africa isn't my responsibility," i become indignant. angry. downright pissed. part of being a human is that we co-exist with other humans. we are part of a system, meaning that my actions inevitably affect someone else. none of us live in isolation from other people. we are ALL part of this interdependent community of humans. nobody gets to opt out. thus, AIDS in africa is everyone's responsibility.

we are all responsible for those millions of children who have lost one or both parents to AIDS. we are all responsible for each man and woman who has died of AIDS.
we are all responsible for figuring out where to go from here.

i can't even describe how much it bothers me to hear people talk about how much they cried after killing a squirrel that ran across them on the road. i just read something like this on facebook -- the lady said she "cried and cried" after running over a squirrel. or how people, and i'm definitely in this group, sit and boo-hoo over reality tv shows or cheesy movies. most of that stuff is made-up and not even close to reality. i'm not saying people should feel guilty about being a sensitive person, but i am wondering why such sensitive people, as myself, can't grieve humanity in this way. why don't we "cry and cry" over those millions of lost lives? i'm not saying we have to cry 24/7 about victims of the AIDS crisis, but why does it always have to be out of sight, out of mind?

so on world AIDS day, i hope you will join me in confronting the numbers...in remembering each and every child who has been orphaned by AIDS and each and every person who has died of AIDS. may we grieve them, weep over them, and confess that we have not done enough to help. i think part of the battle is fought when we stop believing the lie that we have nothing to do with this. because, honestly, when we begin to see that this truly is our responsiblity, i believe that we will be compelled to act -- to pray, to tell, to give, to serve, to adopt...to love our fellow human beings as we love ourselves.