Walk of Ages : Priest Says AIDS March Could Be Catalyst for Change

Compare Orange County to Selma, Ala.? Draw a parallel between the cool Southern Californian suburban ambience and the uneasy caldron of the Civil Rights movement?

Father Rod Stephens would like to see it.

As one of the most visible Catholic AIDS activists in the county, he is in the midst of his yearly fund-raising push for the fifth annual AIDS Walk, to be held in Irvine on Sunday.

Stephens, the director of the office for liturgy of the Catholic Diocese of Orange, believes the walk is no less a social statement--and a potential catalyst for social change--than was the pivotal march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. The march, led by Martin Luther King in 1965, called nationwide attention to the brutal racism of the time in the Deep South.

“We need the Selma experience here,” said Stephens. “So many people who live here have a perception of a county where AIDS doesn’t exist.”

AIDS was unknown in 1974, the year Stephens was ordained. But from the beginning of his priestly career, Stephens was introduced into an environment that would soon bring him in close contact with people dying of the disease.

His first parish assignment in Costa Mesa involved frequent visits to patients in Hoag Hospital, many of whom were suffering from cancer.

“You hear their stories,” he said. “You hear very frightened people who don’t know what’s going on. You see people in all kinds of conditions.”

After a hiatus for study in Belgium and an assignment to a parish in Cypress (where he also counseled hospital patients), Stephens returned to another Costa Mesa parish and regular visits to Hoag.

“By that time,” he said, “AIDS was beginning to be identified. And the fact was that it was affecting gay men more intensely. So there might be isolation of these men from their families, that sort of thing. These were really hurting people in a very frightening situation and on top of it they were being isolated, shut away. They were the type of people that our job as priests draws us to help.

“As I began to meet more of those people, I began to get engaged with them and to talk to them.”

Until 1987, Stephens’ involvement with AIDS was mostly limited to pastoral work with patients. That year, however, he was invited to participate in the first AIDS Walk and later, to serve on its board.

“I just decided that there should be a priest in this diocese, like there is in L.A. and every other diocese, who can say, ‘OK, I’ll identify myself as someone who kind of makes this a particular issue.’ Today, my official job has nothing to do with hospitals, so this gives me a way to have that priestly contact with people. I starve for that priestly dynamic in my life.”

So, he said, do his brother priests in the diocese.

“You can talk to any priest and they have been with and talked to someone with AIDS,” said Stephens.

“Every priest I have talked to says he’s more drawn to care for this person because there’s usually aspects where this person has been isolated. We spend more time, get to know the person more, and sometimes we’re there when they die, at that critical moment.”

The experience of dying as a result of AIDS, said Stephens, is at its core no different from dying of any fatal disease. Except for one thing.

“The issue of dying badly is an interesting one,” he said. “I’ve seen a lot of people die from all kinds of things. Dying badly is when you die alone, when you die isolated, when you die when you’re in fear or your family’s in fear. That’s the bad part of dying (as a result of AIDS), not the disease itself.”

Familiarity with AIDS, said Stephens, breeds not contempt, but understanding, even at the AIDS Walk.

“When people come out and participate,” he said, “it becomes very meaningful for them. Some people walk in memory of someone who has died, or to participate on a difficult journey for a friend who has AIDS. People also walk after they’ve had a significant conversation, after they become more aware. There are a lot of people participating because they realize we have to care for each other corporately as well as individually.

“The whole basis of this country is the fact that we are ‘we.’ If someone is hurting, part of us is hurting. If someone is dying, part of us is dying. That’s not a religious or a spiritual kind of thing, it’s a real issue, the basis of the way we do things in this society.”

That Stephens makes a point of getting that message out whenever the opportunity arises has paid off not only in greater understanding, but in hard cash. As his visibility as a spokesman for the cause has increased in recent years, so have the number of pledges he has been able to obtain for his participation in the AIDS Walk. Two years ago, he said, he raised more than $3,000 in pledges, the second highest amount for a single walker. Last year he was first with $5,800.

Such committed participation, Stephens said, is not at variance with the teachings or interests of his church. The church’s concern about AIDS and its victims, he said, was articulated in a pastoral letter drafted by the American Catholic bishops, which called for concern, compassion and support for AIDS victims from both priests and lay members of the church.

The AIDS Walk may have a consciousness-raising effect similar to that of the civil rights marches of the 1960s, but Stephens said there will not be the same atmosphere of grim purpose.

Though the cause is sobering, the walk has evolved into “a festival of activity,” said Stephens, with participants running, roller-skating and walking, some with their pets.

“A lot of people do that,” said Stephens. “Last year a dog raised about $1,000.”

Begun in 1987 as a vehicle to raise funds for AIDS education, services and research in Orange County, the walk was inspired by the success of a similar event held in Los Angeles, said Stephens. It is now the primary AIDS fund-raising event in the county.

The first walk involved about 1,400 participants and raised more than $100,000. The numbers have grown at each of the succeeding walks, and last year, Stephens said, about 5,000 people made the 10-kilometer trek that began in Mason Park. Participants seek their own sponsorship per kilometer.

This year, the proceeds from the walk will be distributed to 10 agencies, including AIDS Services Foundation/Orange County, AIDS Response Program and the UCI AIDS Education Project.

As of Jan. 31, there were 1,758 reported AIDS cases in Orange County. Of those people, 1,120 already had died as a result of the virus. The great majority of the cases--1,496--were accounted for by male homosexual or bisexual contact. There were 444 new cases reported in the 12 months prior to Jan. 31, a rise of 34% in the number of cumulative cases. That means that more than 18 people in 100,000 were infected.

In a letter he sends out to solicit support for the walk, Stephens quotes Emerson: “What lies before you and what lies behind you are tiny matters compared to what lies within you.”

For information about the AIDS Walk, call (714) 645-6300.