The hands of Pastor Chris Chavez rest before a photo of himself and his brother, Bernie, on Chris' wedding day in June 1991. Bernie Chavez died of AIDS four years later. (Dan Evans/News-Sentinel)

AIDS hits home for Lodi pastor

Pastor Chris Chavez is a volunteer at the AIDS exhibit being held at First Baptist Church, but he needed no introduction to the pain that comes with the sickness.

His brother, Bernie Chavez, died from complications of AIDS 12 years ago.

Bernie's death has motivated his brother to bring greater awareness to the community and try to destigmatize the disease.

"When he died, I didn't know if it was God speaking or some bad pizza, but I had a conviction at the moment that his death would not be in vain," Chris Chavez said.

Chavez has been busy serving on the committee organizing the five-day AIDS exhibit, "Step Into Africa," at First Baptist, which concludes Monday. He is in charge of today's breakfast for local pastors and will guide them through the exhibit.

Chavez knows first-hand how AIDS can strike.

"What's stuck with me, is it's not a sin to be sick," said Chavez, Heartland Community Church's senior pastor of five years.

Bernie Chavez died on New Year's Eve in 1995, at the age of 33. His brother was with him at Vacaville's California Medical Facility, a prison, when he died.

The Chavez family grew up in Orange County, but Bernie Chavez battled drug addiction for much of his life, Chris Chavez said. Bernie was in and out of jail for small crimes, which Chavez believes was due to his brother's inability to cope with their father's death in the early 1970s. Bernie Chavez was 9 when his father died.

"We laughed together, played sports together," Chavez said. "Around 14, he started having a difficult time."

Pastor Chris Chaves of Heartland Community Church thumbs through a Bible, recalling the book of James, chapter one, verse 27, and how it drives him. (Dan Evans/News-Sentinel)

In 1993, Bernie Chavez received some sobering news. He was HIV-positive.

"I was the first person he shared it with," his brother said.

The ensuing struggle with the sickness was difficult.

"One of the challenges of those (with HIV) is that you need to be disciplined with rest, diet, medication," Chavez said. "He lacked that discipline, so he went downhill pretty quick."

One of Chavez's current passions is to destigmatize AIDS and to spread the word that it's not just a gay person's disease. He doesn't think his brother died that way.

"He believes it was drug use, sharing needles, which wouldn't be a big surprise," Chavez said.

But in Lodi and other communities, many people associate AIDS only with homosexuality, Chavez said. And many of those people quote the Bible by saying that homosexuality is an abomination and that such a lifestyle angers God.

"I think the challenge for the church is that it is too easy to say that one sin is worse than another," Chavez said. "People talk about homosexuality, but what about gluttony or anger or jealousy?"

Chavez pointed to Jesus Christ, who literally touched lepers, who were considered social outcasts at the time.

"I think those with HIV and AIDS are similar to lepers in Jesus' day, as far as stigma goes," he said.

Because of his interest in AIDS, Chavez has taken two trips to Uganda and one to Rwanda to visit AIDS-ravaged villages. A group of eight Heartland members will head to Uganda on Saturday to build a home for orphans there.

He said he uses the book of James 1:27 as his inspiration: "Religion that God, our Father, accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

Contact reporter Ross Farrow at rossf@lodinews.com.