Today, along with many deputies and bishops of The Episcopal Church, I learned of the death of Dr. Pamela Chinnis, the first woman to serve as President of our General Convention House of Deputies. My memories of Dr. Chinnis parallel my memories of the years I have served either as a NEAC volunteer or member of the NEAC Board of Directors. She was a strong advocate for all the things that NEAC tries to do. When the AIDS Quilt was displayed in its entirety for the last time on the Mall in Washington, DC, and NEAC had a large number of volunteers who helped fold and unfold the panels of the quilt each day, Dr. Chinnis was there, joined by the Presiding Bishop, to show our church’s support for those infected and affected by the pandemic. Their presence clearly reinforced the NEAC motto: “Our Church Has AIDS.”

However, something that former NEAC chair Bruce Garner wrote in his remembrance of Dr. Chinnis keeps coming back to me. He wrote, “Her understanding of and dedication to justice and inclusion for all was grounded in experiences in her own family…..” If it is true that all mission is local, I believe it is also true that all ministry is personal. We come to our best understanding of our relationships with all of God’s people through our one-on-one recognition of our interconnectedness. AIDS ministry is more profound and more compelling when it is not simply and issue, or a problem, or a disease, but rather an opportunity for us to reach out to another child of God who needs us to represent, to re-present God’s love for that individual who may have been alienated simply by his or her diagnosis.

For this reason, NEAC continues to call the church to ministry to people who have felt the impact of HIV/AIDS.

Richard Brewer is an Episcopal priest who has recently retired as Rector of The Church of St. Luke and St. Matthew in Brooklyn, NY. He is a current member of the Board of Directors of NEAC with which he has been involved since 1997. Chair of the Standing Commission on Health of the Episcopal Church, Canon Brewer has also served six years on the church’s Committee on HIV/AIDS.