Province IV of the Episcopal Church is sponsoring the 17th Annual HIV/AIDS Healing Retreat at Kanuga Conference Center in Hendersonville, N.C., June 6 - 8. And donations are being sought to help low-income individuals who are HIV-positive to attend with their family members and caregivers.

Province IV of the Episcopal Church is sponsoring the 17th Annual HIV/AIDS Healing Retreat at Kanuga Conference Center in Hendersonville, N.C., June 6 - 8. And donations are being sought to help low-income individuals who are HIV-positive to attend with their family members and caregivers.

Lola Thomas, a member of Church of the Ascension, Cartersville, said the annual event is "one of the year's big highlights for the 300 or so people who attend. More than 70 percent are HIV-positive and are extremely low income."

Thomas, executive director of the AIDS Alliance of Northwest Georgia, will accept requests for more information about attending and about donating to this ministry.

Bruce Garner, a member of All Saints', Atlanta, and member of The Episcopal Church Executive Council, recalls that several years ago, a resolution was passed by the Annual Council of the Diocese of Atlanta "urging parishes to donate the cost of one retreat to allow us to cover the cost of the retreat for those without the financial means to pay. Over half of those attending the retreat require financial assistance to do so."

Parishes and individuals wishing to make such a donation may send them to the Finance Office the Diocese of Atlanta (2744 Peachtree Road, Atlanta GA 30305) to the attention of The Treasurer and marked "Province IV AIDS Retreat Scholarship Fund." For more information and a brochure, contact Lola Thomas, aidsalliance@bellsouth.net or 770-606-0953.

More about the conference

This year's retreat, based on the familiar hymn, "It Is Well with My Soul," will provide "a safe place to discuss some of the landmarks of the HIV/AIDS journey: fear, isolation, grief, anger, shame, prejudice and stigma," said Garner.

This year's retreat leader is the Rev. Warren Pittman.  Originally from Los Angeles, his various vocational callings as preacher, pastor and activist brought him to All Saints' Church in Greensboro, N.C., in 1996.

Garner said Pittman's "considerable involvement in the HIV/AIDS community reaches back to the 1980s in California where he served on several secular as well Episcopal and ecumenical AIDS-related initiatives. Pittman's most recent pilgrimages have taken him to South Africa, India, Nepal and Sierra Leone."

The Rev. Jonathan and Deborah Hutchison will be music leaders. He is vicar and she is the lay pastoral associate at St. David's Episcopal Church in Bean Blossom, Ind.  They are singers and songwriters who perform, travel and record as Heartsounds.

The cost of the retreat this year is $175, which includes meals and accommodations.  Some scholarships are available.