(Clap, clap, clap, stomp, stomp, stomp) Stop AIDS! This was the shout-out of the college community last August 21 and 22 that attended the seminar about HIV/AIDS facilitated by the HIV/AIDS awareness team of Camillian scholastics and sisters. The seminar provided more than just information.  It was also an opportunity to taste what it feels to be inflicted with the illness.

Fun and interesting activities characterized the two-day seminar. There were class sessions for group work, processing, games and sharing, and plenary sessions in the auditorium for listening to the speakers.

The first day sessions helped the participants understand the nature of HIV/AIDS and clarify superstitious and discriminatory beliefs about it. Thanks to the entertaining talk of Bro. Dan who made sure the biomedical facts about HIV/AIDS would not cause nosebleed to those with zero medical background. Right on the very first day, the seminarians showed eagerness to know more about something that was new to them.  On the second day, the sessions moved the heart more than the mind. The activity called ‘Wildfire’ brought the seminarians in touch with the hearts of those who live with the illness.

Here are some of their realizations:

“People living with HIV-AIDS are truly discriminated in our society, but let us not do the same to them. Let us not forget that they are still part of our society and even members of our family.  They are still persons. They are not different; rather we are the ones indifferent to them.”
– MARK JOSEPH DEMIT

“Awareness entails responsibility. I'm now responsible for myself and for others. But I will give more focus to others than to myself because, in service, I learned that we are more concerned about the one we serve than about ourselves.”  – JANFERD DACUMOS

“Through the wildfire activity I somehow experienced the hardships and difficulties of people with HIVAIDS.  It led me to a deep reflection on how to relate to them and encouraged me to help more actively in uplifting their spirits.”  – LORETO JUGO, JR.

“As a Camillian, a future minister whose world is among the sick, I recognize the duty to promote among people what I have come to understand about HIV/AIDS.”
– NIMROD CORREA

“Give them a chance to live in a normal world where there is no stigma and discrimination because they are human beings who love and feel the pain of rejection and discrimination.”     – RENAN SUAREZ

“If in the time of Christ, the lepers were the outcasts of society, now it is the people living with HIV-AIDS who are the outcasts.  I hope we won’t need Christ to come down again on earth just to teach us what we should rightly do.”  – ALLAN GASTARDO

“How can I help them? For me, the important thing is my willingness to serve them.  It may be risky, but to follow Christ, I must be His instrument of love by serving others through a total offering of self. God has showered me with many blessings, and now it is the time to share what I received from Him.”  – RONALD JOSEPH DE LOS SANTOS

“People living with HIVAIDS are fighting for their rights. Let us help them to not be set aside in society. They need to be known, loved and served.”  – MARK VINCENT MADRONERO

There are many more. The above just shows how much they have learned. It is not the illness itself that softly kills the people living with HIV/AIDS; it is our ignorance. This is the culprit that blocks them from finding their place back in the world. And in the seminar we have resolved to fight that culprit. Again, (clap, clap, clap) Stop AIDS!