This article was originally published in The Examiner on Dec. 1, 2016.
By Eleanor Skelton
Staff Writer
The Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas hosted its inaugural World AIDS Day prayer breakfast Wednesday.
Baptist Hospital held the prayer breakfast in in the Spindletop Community Room at the Beaumont hospital, located at 740 Hospital Drive Wednesday, Nov. 30.
The prayer breakfast brought together both faith and community leaders to “bring awareness of the needs of our citizens currently infected, affected, or vulnerable to HIV” and “honor lives lost,” Baptist Hospital said in a news release.
Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas has been providing routine opt-out HIV testing and care since October 2011, when Jefferson County was ranked fourth in the state of Texas for the highest number of HIV-positive residents, according to the hospital.
The SmartHealth Clinic at Baptist provides both post-exposure prophylaxis
(PEP), and pre-exposure prophylaxis services intended to decrease new HIV infections in those accidentally exposed or at high risk.
By 2015, the Texas Department of State Health Services data ranked Jefferson County 12th statewide for HIV positive people and 13th with those diagnosed with AIDS.
Mayor Becky Ames and Dr. Garrett Peel spoke at the prayer breakfast, and Chaplain David Cross offered a moment of intercession.
“The Lord reconciled the leper to the community, didn’t he? Who better to lead an outreach to those who are in the shadows, fearful, than the church,” Cross said.
The chaplain also mentioned 847 churches across Southeast Texas in Baptist Hospital’s database partnering with the hospital in treating the disease.
The Rev. James Fuller of Calder Baptist Church gave the conclusion and benediction. He explained that Calder Baptist contributes to Triangle Area Network (TAN) and once had a van ministry to transport patients to UT Galveston for treatment.
“We made sack lunches because it was a long day for those patients,” Fuller said. “We still have a relationship with Triangle Area Network for this reason.”
He shared a story about a young man who visited his church in 1993 and asked permission to attend services. The young man was HIV positive and employed by a local chemical company, Fuller said.
“He said, ‘I just want a church. When my pastor found out my diagnosis, he asked me to leave. It’s the church of my boyhood. I’m a native; my mom and dad are members there. I just want a place to worship, to study the Bible, to serve others,’” Fuller shared with the audience. “I said, ‘Samuel, you are welcome here.’”
Not long after, the young man’s funeral was held at Calder Baptist Church.
“The 500 pound gorilla in this room is why do we feel the way we do about gay people?”
Fuller explained the ancient Jewish ritual of Yom Kippur and how the priest chose a scapegoat.
“I am weary of finding scapegoats in our culture to receive the sins of all of us. When we decided that gay young men, and many gay young black men, were expendable, they became the scapegoat of our culture because we didn’t want to deal with AIDS and how it spread initially,” Fuller said. “We still have that problem. Every congregation in our community is dealing with this.”
“From the mouth of Christ, [we have] not one word of guidance as to how we are to treat gay people. But we have all manner of teaching from Jesus as to how we are to treat people,” Fuller said in his closing statements. “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other as God in Christ has forgiven you.”
“I don’t have gay people or heterosexual people in my church,” he said. “I just have people.”
Eleanor Skelton 