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By Cedriann MartinsEworth Williams, an energetic youth pastor and teacher, isn’t shocked by the stories he hears. The peopleBishop Gerry Seale,nfl jerseys wholesale, Secretary General of the Evangelical Association of the Caribbeanwho come to his ‘Sex in the Church’ meetings, however, are often stunned. On Sunday afternoons, a couple hours after services have wrapped, members from seven or so congregations come together for a wake up call.“Most parents don’t even know what is happening in schools and in the church,” Williams says. “There are rainbow parties where the ladies wear lipstick and give the guys oral sex. The guy with the most colours on his penis wins. Even anal sex has crept in. They say they want to keep their virginity for their husbands so they have sex in the butt.”Here he stops to make what must be a routine check in his line of work: “Are you okay with me discussing these things?” Some people aren’t.“Pastors don’t want to talk about sex in church. They only want to talk about righteousness, peace and God. They don’t want to address the issue from the pulpit but young people are going out there now for the answers,” he says matter-of-factly. Williams is part of a growing movement in the Caribbean evangelical community to dialogue honestly about sex and HIV.The opening to have these conversations came from a unique 2009 study. “Survey of the sexual practices of youth attending Evangelical Churches in Antigua, St. Lucia and St. Vincent” asked probing questions of more than one thousand young church members—everything from how many sexual partners they’ve had to whether they use condoms.Knowledge among the sample on how HIV is transmitted was found to be ‘surprisingly deficient’. 46.7 percent of the church youth had been sexually active while 2.6 percent said that they were HIV positive. (The Caribbean as a whole has an adult HIV prevalence of one percent.)Bishop Gerry Seale,Wholesale Jerseys Outlet, the Secretary General of the Evangelical Association of the Caribbean (EAC), piloted the approach in his native Barbados where a 2006 survey of more than 400 evangelical youth revealed that one percent was HIV positive while 21.7 percent hadYouth pastor Eworth Williamshad sex by age 17. Seale attracted support from the UNICEF Barbados and Eastern Caribbean Office for the larger study.“The message that’s constantly projected is that the at-risk communities are gays,Cheap Jerseys, prostitutes and other persons the church feels are not their constituency. Once we saw the stats it helped me say to the evangelical church leaders that HIV is not about ‘them’ out there in the marginalised communities. It is about us,” Seale says.The study showed that while there was a spike in first sexual activity from ages 15 to 17, almost two hundred respondents had sex at younger ages. Behavioural Surveillance Surveys conducted by the Caribbean Epidemiology Center (CAREC) and Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) in six Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) countries from 2005 to 2006 revealed that early initiation of sex and age mixing among young people are commonplace.This is one of the drivers of the epidemic. According to the 2010 United National General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) Country Progress Report for Antigua there was a three-fold increase in reported cases of HIV among young people from 2008 to 2009 as compared to the previous two year period. St. Vincent’s UNGASS report stated that HIV prevalence among young people is a high 2.5 percent.Seale insists that the church leadership has a moral responsibility to share “scientifically accurate and biblically sound information” about sex. How does the church change its message in light of this? It doesn’t.“The message I strongly give is that the Bible teaches abstinence and faithfulness within marriage. If you are going to step outside of those boundaries for God’s sake use a condom. The message for young people is abstinence. I do not share the pessimism that young people cannot abstain… but if you are going to choose not to abstain you need to use a condom,wholesale nfl jerseys,” says Seale. “I don’t see anything controversial about that.”Starting this conversation has made a wide range of approaches possible. In March 20 young people from four Caribbean countries were taught life skills and given training to share the information with others.“Many children have come from Christian homes with the right morals and values but they still need skills in communication and decision-making,Wholesale China Jerseys,” Williams says.Last year, South African gospel singer Musa Njoko toured a few Caribbean countries and spoke about living with HIV for the past 17 years. Seale sometimes hosts workshops to address stigma in which congregations confront their prejudices during a role play exercise.Young people participate in a life skills training workshop in Barbados.“We pick three persons and have a vote about who gets life-saving HIV drugs. One is gay, one works as a maid and the other works in an escort agency. The voting is usually based on stigma so we have a discussion about that,” explains Seale.Part of Williams’s outreach is to share food, clothes and the church’s message with gays and sex workers in the streets of Georgetown, Berbice and Essequibo.“People are beginning to move from the concept of ‘them’ to one of ‘us’,” Seale says hopefully. “The Christian message is of forgiveness and reformation. Jesus told the woman who had committed adultery ‘I do not condemn you. Go and sin no more’.”Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) country coordinator for Guyana, Ruben del Prado, says that religious leaders are well placed to condemn HIV-related stigma and bring hope and faith to those living with HIV. Those are among the goals of the Guyana National Faith and HIV Coalition which was founded in 2008 with UNAIDS’ support.“Faith-based leaders and their communities are present literally everywhere people live their lives,Cheap Air Max Tn Shoes, with enormous outreach as well as ‘in-reach’. Faith leaders have the power to motivate and guide actions. The words of each faith can influence how society sees people living with HIV and how people living with HIV see themselves,Cheap Jerseys From China,” del Prado says.Seale wants the entire evangelical community to see itself more clearly. He hopes to conduct the study across the Caribbean. This will set the stage for a region-wide revolution and put paid to people’s perceptions that their churches, communities and countries are somehow exempt.“When I go to St. Kitts there’s a tendency for people to say ‘well that’s Barbados, that’s not us’,” Seale says. “Maybe if we get the studies done everywhere more pastors will pay attention.”