Can we respond in that way to others, even others with AIDS? Let me tell you a story. It is a true story. There was a certain church that had a pastor whom everyone loved and admired. For years, he had been there for them. He had loved them and cared for them and preached the Christian Faith to them by word and by example. He had lived among them and raised his children among them and made the whole life of their community better through his ministry.
Then one day one of the pastor's adult sons came back home to live with his parents. He was ill. His parents were caring for him. Eventually, the word went through the community that the pastor's son had AIDS.
How would the church react? This was a down to earth, middle American community with old fashioned moral values. They might have been expected to get angry at the pastor and reject him, saying that he must not have practiced what he preached since he had failed as a parent. They might have been expected to get angry at the son for letting the pastor and the church down. They might have been expected to withdraw from the whole family in natural fear. Any of these things might have happened. But none of them did.
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Instead the church gathered around the pastor and his family and his afflicted son. They surrounded them with loving compassion. They visited. They helped with nursing duties. They washed the linens. They did all they could to help the family through the time of tragic suffering. And when death came, the whole community mourned. That sort of thing can happen. We know that it can happen -- because it did.
In Jesus' day, religious laws forbade anyone to touch a leper. But Jesus reached out and touched the leper because loving compassion required it. In our day, all sorts of things within us and around us forbid us to get involved with people who have AIDS -- or even with the issue itself. But if we are followers of Jesus, we will. We will reach out in love -- and touch. That may not make the disease go away. But there are other ways in which a loving touch can heal.