This story ran in late January in the local paper; I found it rather
amusing that this was placed in the "Health" section, given the overall
religious tone, even though it is about HIV/AIDS in Africa.
Link:
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/living/16479663.htm
Snippet of the story:
<snippet>
Missionary makes HIV in Africa his life's work
By Sue Nowicki
McClatchy Newspapers
(MCT)
MODESTO, Calif. - The numbers of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa are
astounding:
Worldwide, 42 million adults and children are infected with HIV/AIDS; 30
million of them are in Africa. To give an idea of those numbers,
California's population is 36.5 million.
Worldwide in 2003, AIDS killed 3.5 million adults and children; 2.6
million of them were Africans. The latter is more than the population of
Nevada (2.5 million).
"At this moment, the epicenter of this pandemic is in southern Africa,
where it's going like wildfire," said Gil Odendaal of Modesto, Calif., a
South African native who is passionate about the crisis. He said it's a
true pandemic, which is an epidemic raging out of control.
"One of the growing problems in Africa today is child-headed households,
where you can have a 13-year-old taking care of eight or nine siblings.
The life expectancy in Botswana in December 2004 was 27. It used to be
74. Botswana is one of the most prosperous countries in Africa, one of
the richest because of diamonds. In Botswana, the higher death rate is
purely AIDS, (not wars)."
With such large numbers despite the years and money many organizations
have spent trying to address the problem, can anything be done?
</snippet> -- there's more at the link. But what I found truly amusing
was the little sidebar, the "activism" bit, with their first (implying
"most important") bullet-point in the stuff you can do to help people in
Africa being....
<sidebar>
WHAT CAN YOU DO?
Pray - for lifestyle changes and for organizations that are trying to
help stop the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa.
Commit - to living a sexually pure lifestyle yourself and to help your
faith group and community care for its own HIV/AIDS population.
Give - to LifeWind International, P.O. Box 576645, Modesto 95357-6645,
888-403-0600; to your own church or denomination if it supports AIDS
work; to Saddleback Church, 1 Saddleback Parkway, Lake Forest 92630,
www.saddlebackfamily.com.
Consider - serving on short-term teams to Africa. Medical professionals
and lay people are needed. Contact Gil Odendaal at
for more information.
</sidebar>
Funny how money and actual getting-your-hands-dirty work are in 3rd and
4th place, but navel contemplation ranks tops--and a variation on navel
contemplation ranks second.
Blech. Someone's got their priorities utterly backwards.
But then...he's a missionary.
--
Doc Smartass, BAAWA Knight of Heckling
aa # 1939
AUTHORITARIANS ARE PERVERTS. Why?
--They consider themselves shepherds.
--They consider the rest of us sheep.
--Shepherds ***** sheep.
--Therefore AUTHORITARIANS ARE PERVERTS.
.
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