Judd Shares Faith with African Religious Leaders

NAIROBI, Kenya, January 19, 2005 — Evoking the faith she acquired in her childhood in Kentucky, PSI's YouthAIDS Global Ambassador Ashley Judd called on African religious leaders to mobilize their congregations to create an enabling environment for youth to delay sexual debut and adopt other protection strategies, and support and care for those who are infected with HIV.

Ms. Judd, on the first day of her three-week tour of PSI Africa programs, spoke to an HIV/AIDS prevention seminar of the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) that is being supported by PSI and funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development. She called upon churches to challenge cultural and religious practices that render young women vulnerable to HIV infection. In Sub-Saharan Africa, women make up almost 60% of people aged 15-49 living with HIV, according to UNAIDS.

Ashley's YouthAIDS online travel journal states, "I am always most at home with people of faith, and get so much out of talking about this pandemic in such a setting." Religious leaders at the third PSI-supported gathering learned about ways to educate their congregations about HIV/AIDS and to formulate HIV/AIDS policies in their churches.

Judd spoke to them about her vision to protect young people, in particular young girls, from HIV infection through education. "Churches are accepting that they have to preach the truth about how HIV is transmitted from the pulpit, and that they have to address within their faith the many social ills, from gender inequality to superstition to poverty to ignorance, that contribute so mightily to HIV's rampant devastation of Africa," she writes in her travel journal.

The 40 participants at the Nairobi seminar consisted of general secretaries of the national councils of churches, HIV/AIDS program officers, bishops, Kenyan church leaders and AACC staff from 13 English-speaking African countries.

In November 2004, PSI supported a similar seminar for Francophone religious leaders in Kinshasa, Congo, also with funding from USAID. This preceded a June 2004 summit in Nairobi where PSI mobilized 140 influential religious leaders to design an AIDS prevention strategy for their churches. The AACC, representing more than 120 million Christians in 39 African countries, promotes ecumenical relationships, ethical governance and health and wholeness across the African continent.

PSI has worked with religious leaders and faith-based organizations since the mid-1990s, recognizing the influence and importance they have to shape behavior in their communities.

Ms. Judd became the YouthAIDS global ambassador in January 2002 and joined the PSI board of directors in November 2004. She is currently in Africa visiting a variety of PSI and YouthAIDS programs in Kenya, Madagascar, and South Africa.

— Melissa Carlson, PSI/Washington

 

Actor and YouthAIDS Ambassador Ashley Judd addressed a seminar of African church leaders, calling upon them to challenge cultural practicies which render young women vulnerable to HIV/AIDS.