The 2007 Global Summit on AIDS and the Church, a three-day conference intended to empower churches to tackle the epidemic took place on the eve of World AIDS Day.

 

Hosted by Rick Warren, Founder and Senior Pastor of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, and influential author of runaway best-seller The Purpose-Driven Life,”  the event featured religious and public health speakers from around the world: Peter Piot, MD, Executive Director UNAIDS and Under Secretary General of the United Nations, Ambassador Mark Dybul, MD, United States Global AIDS Coordinator and Her Excellency, Mrs. Jeannette Kagame, First Lady of Rwanda and Co-Founder of The Organization of African First Ladies Against AIDS were among the plenary speakers.

 

Last year, for World AIDS Day 2006, the 20,000 member Saddleback Church in Orange County hosted an event that was attended by presidential hopeful Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) and Senator Barack Obama (D- Illinois).

 

All of the presidential candidates were invited again this year, but only Senator Hillary Clinton attended and chose the occasion to launch her proposal to deal with the epidemic. After acknowledging the efforts of the current administration, she vowed to build on those efforts.

 

“Twenty five years ago men – mostly young gay men – began to die from a disease that had no name. We could not talk about it in church. It would not have been polite. It would have been discomforting for so many of us,” said Clinton. “But the disease itself was not polite and ignoring it did not make it go away. It is a problem of our common humanity, and we are called to respond with love, with mercy and with urgency.”

 

Senator Clinton unveiled her strategy to fight disease and raise hope, opportunity and human dignity around the world. The plan includes at least $50 billion to provide universal access to treatment, prevention, and care for global HIV/AIDS by 2013. The plan also includes a $1 billion per year commitment to address malaria infection in Africa, with the goal of stamping out malaria deaths in Africa altogether by the end of her second term.

 

Her plan will reduce poverty, improve health outcomes, increase educational opportunity, expand economic development, and improve political and economic stability around the world. The Clinton plan also includes investments in providing the world’s children with free, basic education, expanding opportunities for women, and eliminating the debt of the world’s poorest countries.  

 

Meanwhile, in Washington DC, hundreds of activists held a rally outside the White House on the eve of World AIDS Day to protest current policies and urge the White House to recommit to fighting the AIDS epidemic. Forty demonstrators were arrested for refusing to disperse.

 

President George W. Bush has responded by calling on Congress to approve an additional $30 billion to fight the worldwide AIDS epidemic over the next five years: “We rededicate ourselves to a great purpose: We will turn the tide against HIV/AIDS — once and for all,” Bush told a Methodist congregation in Maryland that night.

Click here for details on the Long Beach World AIDS Day event.