Across and within congregations, we found a wide range of views towards HIV, people with HIV, and populations at risk for HIV, from highly judgmental and exclusionary, to 鈥渓oving the sinner, not the sin,鈥?to accepting and affirming. Attitudes and norms about HIV, homosexuality, and substance abuse appeared to be related to the type and intensity of congregational HIV-related activities. However, even among the higher activity congregations, we found a range of perceptions, including ones that were stigmatizing.
Results suggest that affirming norms and attitudes are not a prerequisite for a congregation to initiate HIV activities, a finding relevant for HIV service providers and researchers seeking to engage congregations on this issue. HIV stigma reduction is not a prerequisite for congregational HIV involvement: both may occur simultaneously, or one before the other, and they dynamically affect each other. Strategies that are congruent with congregations鈥?current levels of comfort and openness around HIV can themselves facilitate a process of attitudinal and normative change.