Zane Wilemon is in his third and final year of seminary at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, Texas. He graduates in May and will be ordained to the ministry in June. His work in Kenya started in 2000 after he graduated from the University of Kansas. Zane lived in Kenya for one year, and shortly after returning to the US started Comfort the Children International with his brother Rance. Comfort the Children International is a non-profit organization focusing on serving and living with the poor in Kenya.

Q: Describe CTC and the work you do in Africa.
 

A: Comfort the Children International is a grassroots organization about being the change we desire to see in the world. Being the change takes risk. It takes risk because it requires you to extend yourself beyond yourself, or at least what you have known about yourself.

To be honest…that is CTC since its beginning. One person trusting God enough, or being foolish enough to believe what God has to say about God’s self is true: to love God with all your heart, mind, body, and soul and to love your neighbor as yourself. This is a risky endeavor and that is what our organization is about, trying to live fully into what this means to love God and to love our neighbor. It means putting God and others before yourself and it requires us to be more than just a helping hand.

CTC is not in the business of helping people, but in living with people, relationship building. We believe that by sharing lives we instill hope, and hope gives birth to empowerment, and empowerment brings about transformation.

By sharing our lives with the local people in Africa through our education programs, building projects, medical/healthcare assistance, outreach ministries and AIDS awareness we are creating the change that is needed in our world.
 

Q: Both personally and in relation to groups, what role does faith play in the work you do, and in social justice work all-together?

A: This is kind of a twisty tangled mess we are learning to live. We are not a religious organization. We are a humanitarian organization, and yet all of our efforts are rooted in faith. Personally and as an organization we seek to reflect what Christ lived. This only comes through incarnational practices: living the change and that change is fully seen in Christ. So we are a non-religious organization extracting the life blood of what religion claims to preach and living it out in the flesh.

By living incarnational practices we are transforming social justice work by focusing on the “living” and not the “helping”, the “creating” and not the “fixing.” We are co-creators with God and that fleshes itself out by living alternative practices and ways of being in all the social, medical, relational, practical justice work that we do.

Q: What do you think the future of HIV/AIDS relief work is, and what role will religion and smaller non-profits play in that future?

A: Wow…that is a large question. I think our world has seen a great deal of failure in regard to HIV/AIDS relief work. For instance in the town we live in, Maai Mahiu, Kenya, five years ago this town’s population was approximately 20,000 people with a 50% HIV/AIDS infection rate. Today Maai Mahiu’s population has grown to over 30,000 with an HIV/AIDS infection rate of over 70%. This town is only an hour drive Northwest of Nairobi and it is less than 10 miles from the nearest hospital. This hospital is also equipped with antiretroviral drugs. However, less than 1% of Maai Mahiu’s HIV/AIDS infected population is receiving those drugs for several reasons: 1. even though the hospital is only 10 miles away the distance is a 2,000 foot increase in elevation and the dirt road is in poor condition, therefore, no local transport travels this road. 2. The only other option for people to get to the hospital is to go the long way around on paved roads which is at least a half days journey. The cost for one individual to make this journey is a weeks worth of wages. That means if it’s a mother carrying her sick child that is two weeks worth of wages. 3. Once the individual arrives at the hospital there is no guarantee that they will receive the drugs needed either because of cost or because they do not meet the hospitals HIV/AIDS programs standards; such as if an HIV infected married woman arrives at the hospital in need of antiretroviral therapy the hospital requires that her husband be tested for HIV, as well as attend information and counseling sessions before she can receive the medication. Such standards are good because they better insure long term success in treatment. However, the relational aspect is suffering. There is little being done to bridge the gap between these two worlds of HIV infected peoples to drugs or meeting standards to the drugs. 4. A fourth problem is if a person does make the trip to the hospital and meets the hospitals standards there is no assurance that they will have enough of the antiretroviral medication in stock. This is due to the overwhelming number of HIV/AIDS infected people and poor distribution of the medication from developed nations.

This is just one impoverished town in one developing country. You can see the work before us.

I think the role religion and smaller non-profits play in the future is a crucial one. Both religion and non-profits need to be innovative and creative in how they live through this epidemic. For instance, CTC is partnering with the schools of architecture at the University of Kansas and the University of Nairobi to develop a community like center to bring infrastructure, opportunity, and to boost the local economy. Much of the struggle in developing areas like Maai Mahiu is lack of opportunity or positive recreation, therefore, the people resort to the only recreation available which is typically negative: prostitution, drugs, and alcohol abuse. CTC partnering with a local university and a western university insures that resources will be available and what is implemented will be culturally and contextually meeting the needs of the local people. This goes beyond just telling them that they need to stop practicing destructive behavior and follow Jesus. This is giving them an alternative that is built by their hands, for their people, for the betterment of their future. It is innovative, it is practical, and it is desperately needed.

Q: Recount an inspiring story from your work in Africa.

A: It was a cold day in July (winter in Kenya). Our team was recently introduced to a woman named Agnes who was rapidly deteriorating due to HIV. When I met her she was living in what resembled a house or maybe more like an old closet. The room was no larger than the average American’s refrigerator with a worn out bed sheet separating her bed from the rest of the room. I met her daughter first who was busy preparing dinner, hot tea and…hot tea. After talking to the daughter for a while I asked where Agnes was. Her daughter pulled back the sheet separating us from the “bedroom” and there was Agnes lying on the bed, the skin on her face sunk in, her arms as thin as twigs, and she could not sit upright due to the pain and lack of energy. Agnes and her daughter did not speak English so I communicated through Jeremiah Kuria, a friend who works with us and does a great deal of translating for our teams. After talking for a while I quickly surmised that the first thing needed was to get Agnes to the hospital. It was getting late so I told her that I would be back first thing in the morning with a car to take her to the hospital. Before leaving she asked her daughter if we could share a moment of prayer and I gladly accepted her desire to communicate in Spirit. In my mind it was a prayer of desperation.

The following morning Jeremiah, Rance (my brother), and I arrived early. When we arrived we were informed that Agnes had a young son, Jeroge who was six years hold. Agnes was not sure when she gave birth to Jeroge if she had already acquired HIV or not and would like us to take him to the hospital as to have him tested. We agreed and began getting things in order for our departure. When it came time to leave Agnes was not able to walk so Rance had to pick her up from her bed, carry her from the house, through the street, and into the car. That drive was one of the longest of my life: taking a woman, a mother who knows that she is dying and her beautiful innocent son to the hospital to find out if his little body carries a deadly disease.

When we arrived Rance and Jeremiah placed Agnes into a wheel chair and took her into the hospital leaving Jeroge and me to park the car. Once we parked Jeroge and I headed into the hospital and headed straight to the VCT Center (Voluntary Counseling and Testing). We both passed the time making faces at one another and exchanging smiles. The whole time I’m thinking, “Why? Why does life have to be like this?” After an hour or so we were called in for Jeroges’ testing and then asked to wait for the results. Here sat this boy, willingly cooperating and innocently waiting for what…he did not know. And I, I sat there the whole time with the continual thought of, “Why?”

Meanwhile Rance and Jeremiah were left waiting for hours with Agnes hoping to be seen by a doctor by the end of the day. After many hours passed and just before the five o’clock hour they were seen with undesirable results. The doctors informed them that Agnes’ condition was in such a poor state that they did not think the antiretroviral therapy would help sustain her much at all. They recommended that the best thing we could do was to make sure she receives a nourishing diet and is comfortable for her remaining days.

Fortunately, the news concerning Jeroge was not of the same kind. Jeroge tested negative for HIV, but the dark cloud remained over Jeremiah, Rance, and me as we departed the hospital, thankful that Jeroge was healthy, but fully aware that he will be an orphan soon.

We drove in the cool night, no music in the car, only our heavy thoughts circling about us. What do we do? How can we fix this situation? How can we make things better? How do we tell Jeroge? What do we say to Agnes’ daughter?

When we arrived Rance carried Agnes back into the house and after sharing a cup of tea with the family we decided that the best thing we could do was to try and make Agnes comfortable and allow her remaining days to be better than before.

Later that night Jeremiah, Rance, and I relayed the days activities with the rest of our team and we decided that what we would do was provide a fund to supply her with the necessary nourishing foods and spend the next day cleaning out her home, repainting the inside and do what we could to make her home/closet feel like new.

Roaches, roaches, and more roaches. I have never seen so many roaches in my entire life. Big fat black roaches, long skinny brown roaches, and tiny thin tan roaches. When we started cleaning Agnes’ house it put a whole new, and not desirable twist, to “Extreme Makeover.” We took Agnes to our house and allowed her to rest the entire day while we spent the afternoon gutting her house and making it new. We spent the first few hours in shock of all the roaches. To give you an idea: a whole family of chickens flocked all over us like it was a buffet of roaches in Maai Mahiu. Needless to say by the end of the day we were ready for showers and the deed was done.

Agnes was so thankful for the service we had done for her. It was the first time her daughter had seen her smile in weeks. Jeroge was happy and was our little worker that entire afternoon.

That was three years ago. Now Agnes is smiling on a regular basis. She is healthy and walking all over town. Her condition improved so drastically that the doctors placed her on a regular cycle of the antiretroviral therapy and now she is a regular participant in the recently formed HIV/AIDS support group that meets in Maai Mahiu. She is also making a decent income by selling bracelets through a joint program started by CTC and the Pangaea Network called Beads of Hope. With this money Agnes is able to live a self-sustaining life and provide a healthier environment for little Jeroge and the rest of her family.

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