There are a number of ways in which HIV, the virus responsible for AIDS, is transmitted, but still by far the most important worldwide and in particular in the West is sexual transmission. In America and Europe a major and growing route of infection is needle-sharing among drug abusers, but in the past, and still now, it has spread mainly, though far from exclusively, through homosexual contact between men. It is this sexual aspect of AIDS, and its connection with homosexuality, that has made it so controversial, and which has made it so problematic for the Church to find a proper response to it. So it is on AIDS, sex and the Church that I shall focus.

What is the proper attitude of the Church to AIDS? One thing to be said first of all is that the Church’s ministry is one of word and deed. As a body we seek both to proclaim the Gospel and to bring ordinary human comfort to those in need, whoever they may be. We not only preach, teach and defend a message; we also tend the sick, feed the hungry, visit those in prison, and so on. We lay before people the possibility of a fuller life and help them to share in the life that we ourselves have received. The two belong together; ours is a practical Gospel. We cannot, as Church, preach the commandments of Christ without being committed to obey them; we cannot preach his love for us and for all without letting that love reach others through us.