PATTAYA, Thailand – Growing up in a poor, polygamous family in Kenya, Patricia Sawo hated poverty and was desperate to escape it.
As an adult, she managed to break free from poverty only to be flung back into it when she was infected with HIV, which initially made the now evangelical pastor a social outcast.
“One of the things I started to hate at age nine was poverty,” shared Sawo, who is the HIV Ambassador for U.K.-based Tearfund as well as pastor of Deliverance Church in Kitali, Kenya, at the World Evangelical Alliance General Assembly on Tuesday.
“I grew up a bitter child, bitter at poverty, bitter at death – my mother had 12 children but her children kept on dying,” she said, noting that she and her brother were the only ones to have survived to adulthood.
Sawo, who grew up in a roofless hut where rain would force the family into a corner, recalled growing up passionately determined to live a different life and have children that would experience a different childhood than her own.
But she became infected with the HIV virus that plunged her into economic, social, and spiritual turmoil. African church leaders in the 1990s, when she discovered her infection, viewed the disease as punishment from God.
She recalled how after revealing her HIV status at a large Christian revival meeting, she was fired from her government job a week later. Then her husband lost his job as an accountant with the government, and after three weeks, the church asked her to step down from her leadership position. By the fourth week her landlord asked her family to leave the house.
After two years, her children were forced out of public school.
“We didn’t have a meal to put on the table,” recalled Sawo, who is now the regional coordinator for East Africa of ANERELA (the African Network of Religious Leaders Living with or Personally Affected by HIV and AIDS).
“And I thought once more,” she said struggling to hold back tears, “the poverty I saw as a small girl has caught up with me.”
Her family was forced to move to a house that didn’t have a roof.
During her early years of her disease, she would talk to many pastors and church leaders, who all said to her that she must be hiding something that has caused God to punish her with HIV.
In 2002, she went to a conference in Uganda where she learned that HIV is preventable, manageable, and AIDS death can be postponed. Sawo took the news to her church and the church accepted the information and began its HIV/AIDS response ministry.
“I want to tell you, this is the most difficult thing for me,” she said. “When I realized I was HIV positive, the church had nothing to do with me. It was a painful experience. I was bitter, lonely, and I almost lost my faith if not for God.”
After Sawo’s sharing, a “Living Room” session was convened where experts with various experiences with poverty and HIV/AIDS shared and sometimes challenged one another on the issue.
Ngwiza Mnkandla, president of the church planting group Dawn Ministries, shared about the extreme poverty in his homeland of Zimbabwe, which has the highest inflation rate in the world.
More than 5 million people currently need food aid and in some areas people have already begun to die from hunger.
Mnkandla said that he has to cross the border to neighboring Botswana to buy food because the shelves of stores in Zimbabwe are empty. Continue >>
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'However, people's bad choices cannot cause you to miss a blessing'
what happened to the people in jonestown & waco tx. the majority of what christianity teaches is what - obedience. there are verses in the bible that shows how the pharisees tell the people to obey the sabbath law & if you oppose that teaching obedience you are called arrogant, proud, if you do not obey they ACCUSE you of sin. there are thousand of people ruined because of the word - obey. so that is why you end up doing & following a 'childish & immature' teaching bec of the abuse that is going on in the church. they would even quote that story about adam's fall bec. he did not 'obey'.
Mike - First off let me say that you are correct. Our leaders in churches should have more compassion and understanding and mercy. You are correct when you say there are some who are self righteous and arragant like the pharisees.
However, one thing you need to consider. Having a relationship with God is not a group thing its and individual thing. God knows the person who is hypocritical and causees others to stumble. It was Jesus who said that it would better a millstone be tied around the persons neck than to cause one of these to stumble. It may seem as if God doesn't notice, but he does. By the same token he does not excuse the individual for not accepting him because someone has caused them to be turned off from accepting his son Jesus Christ.
Lastly, although i agree the church as a whole needs to realize how serious this thing is. Peoples live are at stake. However, people's bad choices cannot cause you to miss a blessing. Only you can allow a situation to turn you off.
After reading this article, I thought christians & pastors SHOULD have COMPASSION, MERCY, JUSTICE. but instead they behave like the pharisees - self-righteous & arrogant- showing disdain for those who are suffering & then pointing to sin. that sounded like the neighbors of job accusing him of a hidden sin for his suffering or Pharisee-like attitude & behavior - they look down on 'sinners' looking for something to 'accuse' other about their sin. that is why I am turned off with christianity bec. of this kind of 'christian' attitude & 'christ'like' behavior. there are plenty of verses in the bible showing the arrogance of the pharisees, accusing everybody that suffering = sin / sin=suffering. they slap you with 'religion' or shove the bible down your throat when you are in need of help.
another truth is the reason why people 'MISS the BLESS' is not bec. of lack of faith but the arrogance of christians are a 'stumbling block' to the blessings.