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World Council of Churches - News Release
Contact: +41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org
For immediate release - 13/05/2005

"GOD HEALED ME COMPLETELY, ALTHOUGH I AM STILL LIVING WITH HIV"

      Free photos available at
      www.mission2005.org

Gracia Violeta Ross only understood the meaning of her first name (grace)
after discovering she was HIV-positive.

At that point in her life, she thought she was going to die soon, and
asked God for forgiveness for a lifestyle that she felt had separated her
from God's will. "God healed me completely then, although I am still
living with HIV," she told participants at the Conference on World Mission
and Evangelism in Athens.

Ross, a 28-year old Bolivian who grew up in an evangelical family, spoke
at the conference plenary session on Friday, 13 May. Her moving testimony
strongly made the point that healing and cure don't necessarily come
together. "Actually my life became better after becoming HIV-positive."

Ross shared the floor with Johannes Petrus Heath, an Anglican priest from
Namibia living with HIV, Erika Schuchardt, a professor at the University
of Hanover, Anthony Allen, a psychiatrist from Jamaica, and Bernard Ugeux,
a Roman Catholic theologian from France.

All five agreed that in both highly modernized societies and those ravaged
by poverty and lack of basic health care, people yearning for healing of
body and soul knock at the door of churches that are not always open.
While healing doesn't necessarily mean physical cure, churches are called
to be inclusive communities where people feel accepted and experience
God's love and compassion.

"We need a theology of healing that includes the person, the community and
the society," Allen affirmed. Such a theology has to "help Christians to
deal with the stigma and discrimination that condemn people living with
HIV/AIDS," Japé said. For that to happen, the theology must state
clearly that "sickness, and particularly HIV/AIDS, are never a punishment
for sin," Ugeux added.

Equipped with such a theology, Christian communities are able to provide
the "welcoming space of acceptance and non-discrimination that allows
people to face the crisis that illness poses to their lives," Schuchardt
said.

You can watch the full video recording of this plenary on our website:
www.mission2005.org/webcast.html

Free high resolution photos to accompany this story are available at:
http://cwme.wcc-coe.org/High_resolution.884.0.html

Conference website: www.mission2005.org

Additional information: Juan Michel,+41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363
media@wcc-coe.org

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The World Council of Churches is a fellowship of churches, now 347, in
more than 120 countries in all continents from virtually all Christian
traditions. The Roman Catholic Church is not a member church but works
cooperatively with the WCC. The highest governing body is the assembly,
which meets approximately every seven years. The WCC was formally
inaugurated in 1948 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Its staff is headed by
general secretary Samuel Kobia from the Methodist church in Kenya.