Compelled to help in the fight against HIV/AIDS

Salt shakers
August 2000

"Compelled to help" in the fight against HIV/AIDS
Whoever is most rejected by society—that's who Gwen Currin feels most compelled to help. Eight years ago, she decided that meant people living with HIV/AIDS, especially in the African-American community.

"This is just something I'm accustomed to doing," says the 81-year-old Currin, who doesn't look a day over 50. "The Lord has just given me a gift and I use it."

The National Catholic AIDS Network (NCAN) doesn't take her work as a volunteer pastoral counselor so lightly. This year, the organization honored her with a Lumina Award at its annual conference, held July 20-25 at Loyola University in Chicago.

Currin spends one day a week at the outpatient AIDS clinic at Michael Reese Medical Center in Chicago, greeting and visiting with patients. "I just try to be their friend or walk with them," she says. "I try to establish a relationship—if they want it."

Although "no case is the same," Currin always tries to offer unconditional compassion and care. Her training with the interfaith AIDS Pastoral Care Network taught her about the disease and about the spiritual struggles faced by people living HIV/AIDS.

Among the many patients she has cared for, she especially remembers one "who just happened to be Catholic" who she helped to return to the church and another she saved from suicide. "I'm not supposed to give out my home number," she confesses. "But I had a gut feeling that time."

Over the years, Currin has seen an increase in African-American clients, and as a person of a mixed racial background, she is especially concerned about the rise of infection in the African-American community. Isolation and shame are a danger for African-Americans living with HIV/AIDS. "They're very close knit, and they keep to themselves," she says.

"Also, they have had so much rejection and hardships, including poverty and lack of education. Everything is already so negative, and this doesn't help any," she says. "I just try to tell them they can't hold on to that. I try to help them to think positive and to accept help from people who want to help."

Currin herself is a model of positive thinking. "I just think there are more good people in this world than bad people," she says. And she would never think of judging a person by how they contracted HIV/AIDS. "They're God's people," she says.

Currin credits her involvement in AIDS ministry to a source some might think unlikely: the Legion of Mary. "A lot of people think the Legion is little old ladies praying the rosary and doing nothing," she Currin, who has been a member since 1959. But the organization requires members to do regular outreach work. "So when the [AIDS] crisis came up, I thought the Legion should be involved."

Currin's next task is to establish an AIDS ministry at her parish, St. Dorothy's on Chicago South Side. "Every church should really have some sort of AIDS outreach," she says. "There's not one of us who's not going to be affected by this disease in some way."—Heidi Schlumpf

For more information:
National Catholic AIDS Network

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