Malawi Churches to married couples: Satisfy each other to avoid extramarital sex affairs, fight Aids
The Malawi Council of Churches (MCC) has said lack of openness amongst married couples on issues of sexuality and satisfaction is fuelling the spread of HIV in families.
MCC said couples who fail to satisfy each other sexually, tend to seek extra-marital affairs thereby breeding the HIV.
“We as church leaders and marriage counselors should endeavor to help couples to open up within the wed locked bedroom walls so that fulfillment in the flesh is realized,” MCC General Secretary Rev. Dr. Osborne Joda-Mbewe said.
Joda-Mbewe said this during the closing ceremony of a four day Training of Trainers (TOT) One Body Central Region Workshop on HIV and AIDS held in the central region district of Ntcheu.
The One Body Material is collaboration among four countries namely Mozambique, Zambia, Norway and Denmark.
Through the One Body Material churches from the Nordic – FOCCISA regions have been brought together to fight stigma and discrimination against people living with HIV and those who have AIDS.
“A child who is not well fed at home will always go elsewhere to beg for food. Similarly, a husband or a wife who is unsatisfied in the matrimonial bed will go out to seek satisfaction,” he said.
Rev. Dr. Joda-Mbewe then said the church has a duty to ensure that such practice stop, saying the only way is by empowering people to understand the gift of sex as given by God.
“We are glad that the One Body material provides information necessary to equip people in local communities and globally, who are controlling and in charge in the teaching, preaching, worshiping and other pastoral and congregational work to promote theological reflection on issues raised by the HIV and AIDS pandemic,” he said.
He noted that stigma and discrimination is killing many people.
“Let us exercise some compassion and be stewards of the people on how human sexuality can be best enjoyed as a gift from God and make lives of those already infected and the affected even enjoyable as the church is an inclusive and not an isolated community,” the Man of God said.
He then urged the participants to return home, teach and inspire those that are affected and infected so that they can still serve the kingdom of God better.
“We should go back and lead them in also encouraging and motivating others to live positively and with the desired change in the spiritual, physical, and healthy aspects of their lives,” Rev. Dr. Joda-Mbewe said.
Opening the workshop earlier in the week, MCC Board Member Bishop Bright Malasa the Church does not expect stigma and discrimination within its confines.
“This is why this training will also touch on how contextual Bible Study and human sexuality as a gift from God can best be used to make lives of those already infected and the affected better.” Bishop Malasa said.
He said there is a great need for all of us to understand, as church leadership and stewards of God’s creation, that the church is an inclusive and not an isolated community.
The Coalition of Women Living with HIV and AIDS (COWLHA) also noted recently that culturally people in the country tend to treat issues of sexuality and satisfaction as a secret hence an increase in infidelity and spread of HIV.
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