The Drum Beat 257 - Faith-Based Communication for Change
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What potential does faith - religious belief, worship, spirituality - hold for practitioners who use communication for development? How and why do faith-based organisations (FBOs) use communication to effect social change? What lessons can be drawn from these perspectives, practices, and strategies? This issue of the Drum Beat presents some initiatives and resources that address or reflect faith-based social development. These items have been divided into just 2 of among many possible categories - HIV/AIDS and children/youth - about which FBOs can or do have a voice. Please visit The Communication Initiative website for more resources.
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HIV/AIDS
Also see the HIV/AIDS Window
1.The Sangha Metta Project - Thailand & Eastern Asia
Buddhist monks initiated this project when they sensed they needed to play a more active role in addressing ignorance about HIV/AIDS prevention and care. Training involves monks accepting and eating alms food prepared by people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). In contrast with their formal roles, project-trained monks use Buddhist ethics as a guide for teaching villagers how to avoid high-risk behaviour, set up support groups, train PLWHA to make handicrafts, donate alms, and care for AIDS orphans. Because local people are accustomed to telling monks their troubles, the latter have become a conduit for identifying HIV-positive people and referring them to public assistance programmes. "HIV-friendly" temples foster participation.
Contact Laurie Maund lauriejm@gmail.com
2.Groupe Chrétien Contre le SIDA au Togo (GCCST) - Togo
The Christian Group against AIDS in Togo (GCCST) is made up of volunteers whose mission is to address stigma and the lack of communication they think contribute to AIDS, especially among the poor and those living in remote regions. In addition to medical, psychological/spiritual, and nutritional care-taking, GCCST works to build awareness about sexuality and HIV/AIDS through workshops and dialogues held in schools, churches, and marketplace areas. Goals include providing relief to the affected, many of whom have been ignored or rejected by their families, and effecting behaviour change related to HIV prevention.
Contact Koku Tsigbe gccst@yahoo.fr
3.Community Mobilisation Model for Prevention of Mother to Child HIV Transmission (PMTCT) & Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) - Uganda
The Islamic Medical Association of Uganda selected 25 trainers from Christian and Muslim faiths to increase awareness and promote demand for ART services among 750 community educators. Trainees then informed their communities about PMTCT and ART through sermons, group talks, and home visits. The project was designed for faith-based organisations seeking to complement government efforts.
Contact Magid Kagimu mmkagimu@utlonline.co.ug
4.The Indonesia HIV/AIDS, STDs Prevention and Care Project - Indonesia
AusAID is mobilising religious networks in several Indonesian provinces to educate their communities about AIDS prevention, to advocate behaviour change, and to develop a model for the care of people with HIV/AIDS. Islamic preachers are trained to provide outreach to parishioners, as well as to youth groups, sex workers, migrant workers, and those vulnerable to sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). These religious leaders are urged to consider relaxing strict prohibitions (like those that decry condom use) in the interest of community welfare.
Contact kangguru@ialf.edu
5.In AIDS Battle, PSI Builds Bridges to Religious Leaders
Population Services International (PSI) prevents AIDS by, in part, building bridges with religious leaders. The article provides examples of work based on strategies developed and tested in collaboration with Muslim, Christian, and Buddhist leaders in West Africa, Zambia, and Laos. The aim of these workshops, conferences, and discussion sessions is to help religious leaders see that they can and should play a role in the fight against HIV/AIDS - and to show them how.
6.Churches and Communities of Faith: Significant and Sustainable Partners in the Fight Against the Diseases of Poverty
by Milton B. Amayun
After attending the Haiti Health Summit and a World Vision health assessment programme, this author concludes that the faith community "has a lot to offer to the world's intensified battle against the diseases of poverty. The most basic strengths are its ubiquitous presence, its programs of outreach to the poor and its pool of committed personnel to accomplish tasks." Dr. Amayun believes that the faith-based network precedes the current outpouring of donor resources and should not be overlooked when HIV/AIDS and other programmes are being created.
Resources
7.African Jesuits AIDS Network
A social ministry in Africa that responds to people living with HIV/AIDS by promoting prevention, sensitivity to local culture, faith and spirituality, and collaboration.
8.HIV/AIDS Prevention, Care and Support across Faith-Based Communities: An Annotated Bibliography of Resources
Family Health International/IMPACT and USAID produced this annotated bibliography of HIV/AIDS resources for faith-based organisations. The 51-page resource offers tools such as assessment and planning guidelines, as well as details about where and how to access further information.
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PULSE POLL
To increase community participation, a budget line for "research video" (digital camera + monitor) should be included in all development projects, for staff briefings, community broadcast and as a substitute for monthly reports.
[For context, please The Drum Beat 256]
Do you agree or disagree?
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CHILDREN/YOUTH
9.The African Religious Leaders Assembly on Children & HIV/AIDS - Africa
In June 2002, 120 senior religious leaders from across Africa (25% of whom were women) convened in Nairobi, Kenya on behalf of the Hope for African Children Initiative. The aim was to galvanise their commitment to and engagement in children's needs and to encourage them to mobilise their religious communities to reduce stigma by confronting and breaking down the social shame of HIV/AIDS. Topics such as prevention, treatment, and institutional versus community-led care for orphans were addressed from a theological perspective.
Contact Beatrice M. Spadacini bspadacini@hopeforafricanchildren.org
10.Wire the World - Global
Oasis Trust is a Christian organisation working in 13 countries to deliver global, community, youth, and church action initiatives. Wire the World is based on the belief that people need more than basic education to escape poverty. The use of open source software decreases costs. One site, located in a school in a Bombay slum, makes the premises available to street kids and school drop-outs in the evenings. Impact data indicates that young people there have progressed from learning simple Microsoft Word skills to programming courses within 3 months. Job placements can also happen quickly.
Contact David Babington-Smith david.babington-smith@net2work.org
11.Condom and Sex Education Initiative - Trinidad
In May 2003, Svenn Miki Grant, community outreach coordinator of the Young Men's Christian Association in Port of Spain, Trinidad stood outside a secondary school and the library and handed out condoms and sex education literature to school children. Grant claims to be "developing young people's skills so that they make choices about their behaviour and feel confident about acting on these choices". He promotes open discussion of sex - and the provision of tools to have sex safely. Religious groups said his actions endorse "illicit or unlawful sex".
Contact Svenn Miki Grant ymca@wow.net
12.Pedals of Peace - China & the United States
In May 2004, a group of teenagers left Washington, DC, USA to embark on a weeklong, 700-mile bicycle ride. Their goal was to draw attention to the plight of children and youth in China who are, according to organisers, persecuted due to their own or their parents' participation in a Chinese meditation/spiritual practise called Falun Gong. ("Young practitioners' parents are taken away to labor camps and jail when no one is to care for the kids at home...If the principal of his or her school finds out, they will expel the student from that school..."). A rally, postcards, and a website were developed.
Contact Court Pearman court@dcemail.com
13.Together for a Happy Family Campaign - Jordan
In March 1998, the Jordanian National Population Committee launched a 2-year multimedia campaign in an effort to get men involved in family planning. As part of a strategy to raise awareness among Jordanians who do not know that Islam permits modern family planning methods, religious leaders participated in observational tours and training in Egypt. Islamic scholars wrote booklets that were distributed to religious leaders, the general public, mosque libraries, and Islamic centres. Religious leaders discussed campaign themes during family programmes on TV and radio, responded to questions from the audience, and wrote newspaper articles.
Contact Alfred Yassa OR Soliman Farah orders@jhuccp.org
14.Distrust Reopens the Door for Polio in India
by Amy Waldman
"Rumors circulating throughout certain Muslim neighborhoods have led some parents to refuse to vaccinate their children against polio due to fear that the oral vaccine - which is inexpensive and widely available - is part of a government-organised forced sterilisation plan....In an attempt to address this growing problem, the Indian government and the World Health Organization, in partnership with Unicef and Rotary International, initiated a drive in early 2003 to immunise 150 million Indian children, many of them in Uttar Pradesh. This campaign involves sending health workers door-to-door with oral drops to areas who share the same religion and class as the families who are visited, where possible."
Resources
15. Casa Alianza
A Latin American, faith-based NGO providing information and advocacy on street children and their vulnerabilities.
16.The World Conference on Religion & Peace (WCRP)
Mobilises religious community networks on every continent, creating multi-religious partnerships that draw on the moral and social resources of religious people to address their shared problems.
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This issue was written by Kier Olsen DeVries.
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The Drum Beat seeks to cover the full range of communication for development activities. Inclusion of an item does not imply endorsement or support by The Partners.
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