Finishing the Race: Advocating for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria
Red Letter Christian Blog
May 16, 2024
by Jenny Eaton Dyer, PhD
When I was a little girl, probably 11, I sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the podium at Belmont Church to hear a special guest speaker, Tony Campolo. I was with my youth group traveling from Murfreesboro, TN to the big city of Nashville to hear this famous minister. We had front row seats.
I vividly remember Tony speaking above me because for one, he was showering the kids up front with a little spittle every time he said a stopped consonant. But, all kidding aside, I also remember that Tony had a radical sermon of agape love for those who were victims of HIV/AIDS that evening.
The tension in the room was palpable, especially among the evangelical adults. Tony was calling us to rethink our role with the gay community and to choose to open our arms to those fighting HIV/AIDS. In the late 80s, on the back of a decade when Christians and our government had shunned the community, this was almost an unthinkable sermon, calling the virus a punishment for the crime of homosexuality. Tony, of course, had an alternate teaching: love your neighbor.
I have carried this sermon, one among thousands I cannot remember, with me, and I owe my career perhaps to his calling that evening. He inspired me, even then, to begin thinking critically about my faith, my church’s teachings, and the framework of theology around me. I began to have deep sociological, psychological, and exegetical questions about the church and scripture. Eventually, I sought to untangle these questions through religion degrees at the university. This primed me to be ready to be a leader in a campaign called the Heart of America Tour in 2002 with Bono leading the way.
As a backpack-carrying twenty-something activist seeking a PhD in religion and a temp job at Thomas Nelson Publishers, I co-edited a book, The aWAKE Project: Uniting Against the African AIDS Crisis, pulling together authors from Nelson Mandela to Franklin Graham. All aligned to say that this virus was hollowing out the continent of Africa, and we needed to join forces to stop the pandemic killing millions. I wound up being asked in 2003 to lead the faith outreach nationally for Bono’s organization, DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa).
This was the beginning of my 22-year career fighting systemic poverty issues, including the infectious diseases pandemics of AIDS, TB, and Malaria.