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Black Churches Creating Safe Spaces to Combat Silence and Stigma Related to AIDS

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Abstract

AIDS has been one of the most severe contemporary crises to affect Black American communities. With epidemic rates surpassing several African nations, health professionals and AIDS activists have called on black churches to help lead the fight to end AIDS. This study examines the response efforts of eight black churches (three of which are megachurches) to this illness. Interviews reveal three specific approaches used to address HIV- and AIDS-related stigma and silence—quilting, prayer, and practices in liberation theology. Overall, these approaches illuminate the progressive and conservative forces that make some churches more effective than others in ending multiple silences and stigmas surrounding AIDS.

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Notes

  1. The term “black church” has historically been defined in two major ways—(1) denominations that are historically controlled and attended by black Americans and (2) churches with predominantly black congregations (Lincoln and Mamiya 1990). This study utilizes the second more generalized definition.

  2. Megachurches are often regarded as large churches with congregation size of 2,000 or more parishioners.

  3. In the remainder of this paper I use PWHA to refer to people living with HIV and AIDS.

  4. Approaches include: the creation of literature racks and bulletin boards with relevant HIV and AIDS related information, participation in World AIDS Day and so on.

  5. Liberation theology is the term used by the pastor of the church to describe the grounding principles that guide his religious approach to address AIDS. I discuss this further in the Results and Discussion section of the paper.

  6. See Farmer (2010) for a historical overview of the exclusion of the needs of black women living with AIDS in America and the world.

  7. This paper primarily focused on sex and sexuality; however intravenous drug use is another key transmission mode for HIV infection (CDC 2010a). In the District of Columbia, needle exchange remains a very contentious political issue.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the Sociology Department at the University of Maryland for providing me with the financial support to write this paper over the summer of 2010. I would also like to thank Dr. Ivy Ken for advising me through this research. My sincere thanks Dr. Sangeetha Madhavan for your inspiration, words of support, and critical comments to improve this paper. I would also like to thank Robert Holder for his unending encouragement and to Kasia Skuratowicz, Dania Beadle, and Tamara Wilds Lawson for their edits and comments. Finally, and most importantly, I would like to thank the respondents who volunteered their time and stories for this project.

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  1. Department of Sociology, 2112 Art/Sociology Building, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, 20742, USA

    Michelle Beadle-Holder

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Correspondence to Michelle Beadle-Holder.

Appendix

Appendix

Demographic Overview of Churches and Research Participants

Table 1 Profile of church and research participants from church
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Table 2 Profile of faith-based organizations and participants from the organizations
Full size table

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Beadle-Holder, M. Black Churches Creating Safe Spaces to Combat Silence and Stigma Related to AIDS. J Afr Am St 15, 248–267 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12111-011-9159-0

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