Communities Working For a Brighter Future
Youth Rally
From late April to mid-May last, Barbara McCauley, Mission Development Office, and I visited projects in South Africa that are funded, or part-funded, through the Mission Development Office (MDO). We divided our time between Oblate missions in the greater Johannesburg, Bloemfontein and Durban areas. This article is about some of the people we met in the Bloemfontein area and the work being done on many fronts to combat the scourge of HIV/AIDS.
After a few wonderful days with the Oblates in Johannesburg and the greater Jo?burg area, Bloemfontein seemed a more compact and easy-going city. All six Oblates from Ireland and Britain who work here were at the Airport to welcome us and take us to Oblate House, our base for the next week.
They are part of a team, which includes missionaries from Belgium and Germany, as well as a growing number of South Africans. Four of the six work with communities in or close to the City; two have pastoral responsibility for communities in the township of Botshabelo, about 80 kilometres away.
Even in the limited time that we were able to spend in these communities, we could see the work being done to provide very poor communities with facilities for education and social life, as well as the care programmes set up to support individuals and families affected by HIV/AIDS.
Of all the centres in the world that are caring for people afflicted by HIV/AIDS, 26.7% are Catholic based. That statistic is reflected too in the Archdiocese of Bloemfontein where programmes range from education initiatives that engage with young people, to the provision of full Anti-Retroviral Treatment, including home-based support. And there are ambitious plans in the pipeline to further extend the range and depth of response.
Student rally
One of the highlights of our visit to Bloemfontein was the ?Rally? for Catholic university students. It was held in the centrally located Sacred Heart Cathedral, and hosted by Frs. Leo Roche and John Nolan who have pastoral responsibility for the parish.
The theme for this year?s rally, organised by Oblate university chaplains, Pat Towe and Tsidiso Moleko in conjunction with ACTS (the Association of Catholic Tertiary Students), was on changing lifestyle and attitudes. Preparatory work for the rally places the emphasis on training the next generation of community leaders.
About 800 young people took part in the full and varied programme. Using a mix of guest lecturers and dramatic presentations acted out by student actors, the clear and consistent message was that your future and the future of your community requires that you:
? abstain from crime, substance abuse and irresponsible sexual behaviour;
? be faithful to yourself, your family, friends and community;
? change your lifestyle and behaviour through making informed choices and living the values of your African culture;
? Otherwise, you risk getting involved in crime, addiction, or contracting HIV/AIDS.
The message was enthusiastically received by the students, many of whom will soon be opinion leaders in the communities.
As an outsider listening to these young people, one could only feel hopeful. It was possible to believe that, with leadership and commitment, the current difficult social, cultural and economic problems can be overcome within a generation.
Care programmes
After an overnight stay with Fr Tommy Swords in Botshabelo township, Br Rex Harrison, an Oblate Brother and the co-ordinator of the diocesan response to HIV/AIDS, introduced us to key people in the diocesan response team.
Sr Adeline Lesaoana, a Holy Family Sister, and her small team organise and support Home Based Care (HBC) volunteers who support people on the ART programme through a ?buddy? system. Without this support, ART is likely to fail.
The next stop was an unusual looking but very efficient ART Clinic, adapted from refrigerated containers, and a meeting with a truly amazing Irish woman from Kilkenny, Sr Alicia Hogan.
Sr Alicia, a Holy Cross Sister and a highly skilled nurse, runs the very busy ART Clinic in Botshabelo and trains others for this work. She brings incredible energy and focus to her work at the clinic.
HBC and ART programmes go together in the care of people who have no tradition of taking medication when they feel well. ART, however, only works when taken as prescribed. Counselling and the kind of ?buddy? support offered by HBC are vital to the success of the programme.
Up to now, HBC has depended totally on volunteers, each with her/his own family commitments, freely giving of their time. This all important element in the care programme attracts little or no funding.
It was in the Bloemfontein area that we came closest to the people, in the first place through taking part in wonderfully exuberant Eucharistic celebrations in the townships, and later through such experiences as praying silently at the lonely deathbed of a young woman called Katarina in her empty hut.
We visited the home, more hovel than house, that a clearly depressed mother of five shared with her in-laws. Saddest of all, perhaps, was the wretched little home of five beautiful children ranging in age from 6 months to 14 years. Their mother had died and their father was doing his best to support them through his part-time job in another city.
And we met some wonderful people who are living with HIV/AIDS. Coming into such close contact with this cruel pandemic and its shattering consequences has given us a new determination to do what we can to support the work of the missionaries on the ground.
Barbara with HBC support team