RevCyn

A friend and colleague asks, "When did our Principles ever lead us to a place we didn't already want to go?" It's a bit like asking "When is something truly altruistic?"  The fact that I did something might argue that to some extent I wanted to do it -- that I felt doing it served some purpose.  But sweeping aside the philosophical question, I think I can point to places our Principles have led me that I was at least conflicted about.  The first time I remember being pushed by my principles to do something that I was uncomfortable doing was in graduate school.  I became aware that I had what I knew was an unreasonable fear of people with HIV/AIDS.  And I felt that my principles called me to address my fear and get over it.  And so I volunteered to spend my spring break with the Alternative Spring Break program working for the Mobile (AL) AIDS Support Services.  I've written about that experience in this blog before. The next time I felt like my ...

Today is World AIDS Day , so to create an opportunity to help people think about doing something for World AIDS Day, I'm going to tell you a story.  This is the story of how I first became involved in the issue. Long before I knew that I knew anybody with AIDS or who was HIV+, long before I had the unfortunate honor of performing my first funeral for a man who died from AIDS, I recognized in myself a fear and a prejudice.  That was the start.  I knew that I was unreasonably fearful of people with AIDS, to the point where I feared I would act in a prejudicial manner towards somebody with AIDS.  My friend Manda and I had volunteered the previous year (1995) for a program called " Alternative Spring Break " and had spent our spring break working for the physical disability rehabilitation center in Warm Springs, Georgia the year before (we met during that program), and were both considering doing the program again.  I think it was Manda who first suggested that ...