Posted on 08/21/2023 1:36:55 AM PDT by Morgana
(RNS) — The Rev. Stephen Pieters, a minister and HIV/AIDS activist best known for his exceptional interview with televangelist Tammy Faye Messner in 1985, died Saturday (July 8) at age 70.
After four decades of defying doctors’ diagnoses of terminal conditions related to HIV, as well as the stigma associated with AIDS in the early years of the epidemic, Pieters died from gastrointestinal cancer in Los Angeles, after being hospitalized for an infection, his spokesperson, Harlan Boll, told Religion News Service.
“His remarkable story of recovery served as an inspiring example of healing and hope to many across the country and around the world,” Boll’s statement read.
It was during the depths of experimental medical treatment that Messner, then Tammy Faye Bakker, spoke with Pieters on “Tammy’s House Party,” a talk show broadcast on her and her then-husband Jim Bakker’s PTL (Praise the Lord) network that at the time drew some 20 million viewers. Messner died of cancer in 2007. RELATED: A divinity school steps up to fight the HIV epidemic in the South
Pieters negotiated for the 25-minute interview to be live, so his responses would be impossible to edit or scrap altogether. Pieters joined the show via television from Los Angeles, with a live satellite feed to the PTL set.
The vanguard interview aired in an era when fear and false information about HIV/AIDS ran rampant in conservative Christian communities, as preachers and broadcasters such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson perpetuated AIDS disinformation.
Some of Messner’s questions come across as antiquated to modern ears — she inquires, for instance, if Pieters “gave girls a fair try” — but she displayed an empathy toward Pieters that was unprecedented for her listeners and indeed for Americans at large. Hearing of Pieters’ faith, Messner wept and declared she wished to wrap her arms around him in a hug.
“How sad that we as Christians — who are to be the salt of the earth, we who are supposed to be able to love everyone — are afraid so badly of an AIDS patient that we will not go up and put our arm around them and tell them that we care,” Messner implored her viewers.
“Jesus loves me just the way I am. I really believe that. Jesus loves the way I love,” Pieters told Messner, after sharing his experience of coming out as gay and being hospitalized multiple times.
Appearing in November 1985, the interview followed President Ronald Reagan’s first public use of the word AIDS, which came in response to a reporter’s question on Sept. 17, four years after the crisis began and after thousands of Americans had died from the disease.
Born Aug. 2, 1952, in Andover, Massachusetts, Pieters attended Northwestern University, graduating in 1974, and in 1979, earned a Master of Divinity degree from McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago. He soon moved to Hartford, Connecticut, as the pastor of Metropolitan Community Church, an outpost of the Protestant denomination founded to affirm LGBTQ Christians.
In 1982, he resigned from his Hartford church and took an MCC church in Los Angeles, where he was diagnosed with AIDS-Related Complex, known then as GRID, or gay-related immune deficiency. In April 1984, he was given diagnoses of Kaposi’s Sarcoma and stage four lymphoma. The prognosis was grim. Pieters’ doctor told him he had less than a year to live.
Two weeks later he preached an Easter sermon on Jesus’ resurrection after his crucifixion on Good Friday. “God is greater than AIDS,” Pieters proclaimed to his congregants, reassuring them about his own seemingly imminent demise. Gasps were nonetheless reportedly heard in the pews.
Pieters survived long enough to be the first patient to participate in an experimental trial for suramin, the first antiviral drug for AIDS, which was subsequently recalled for its severe toxicity. But for Pieters, suramin put his cancer into remission.
Fluctuating between extreme illness and activism for the rest of his life, Pieters raised awareness about AIDS and acceptance for those who suffer from the disease. He served from 1987 to 1998 as field director of the MCC’s AIDS ministry. He volunteered as a chaplain at an AIDS hospice in Los Angeles.
The watershed conversation with Messner transformed Pieters into a nationally recognized figure and launched Messner’s reputation as an ally of the queer community. The interview with Pieters has been valorized in pop culture in the 2021 film “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” in which Pieters was played by Randy Havens (and for which Jessica Chastain, a producer on the film, won the Academy Award for Best Actress).
“Steve Pieters was an inspiration and advocate for those living with HIV/AIDS for over 35 years. He was a constant reminder that God is LOVE. Rest In Peace, sweet angel Steve. You made a difference in the lives of so many and you will be missed,” Jessica Chastain posted on Twitter.
The Pieters interview was also portrayed in Elton John’s musical “Tammy Faye,” which opened in London in October 2022.
Pieters, one of the longest-term survivors of HIV in the United States, sang with the Los Angeles Gay Men’s Chorus since 1994 and served on its board of directors from 1994 to 1999.
“There was no one like Steve Pieters,” said GMCLA Executive Director Lou Spisto. “Our lives were made better by what Steve did with his time on earth. He lifted us all. He fought so hard and for so long, for his life and for all of ours, that this seems unreal. He will never be gone though, as his spirit will be with us always and his impact will live on.”
Pieters’ memoir, “LOVE Is Greater Than AIDS: A Memoir of Survival, Healing, and Hope,” is set to be published in 2024, according to a GMCLA statement.
In an interview with ABCNews last fall, Pieters said, “Quality of life is not measured by the length of life, but by the fullness with which we enter into each present moment. And so, in this moment, right here, right now, I choose to feel joy. I choose to feel gratitude. I choose to feel just incredible peace about my life and all the ways God has used me in this life: to spread the Word of God’s healing love for all people,” repeating, “for all people.”
I remember this! Everyone was talking about it. It was shocking at the time.
"...where he was diagnosed with AIDS-Related Complex, known then as GRID, or gay-related immune deficiency"
I remember when AIDS was called GRID. It was also called "gay cancer" because the symptoms mimic cancer and mostly gay men caught it. In Africa it was called the "slim disease" because everyone who caught it were walking skeletons.
Kaposi’s sarcoma is caused by abuse of amyl nitrite poppers.
“AIDS-Related Complex, known then as GRID, or gay-related immune deficiency”
The disease was renamed by Anthony Fauci so as to reduce the “stigma”.
“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil”….Isaiah 5:20
Yes, Jesus forgives a repentant sinner
Jesus loves the sinner but hates the sin…….calling on the sinner to depart from it
My reading of this casts Christians as unloving and not embracing the ‘gay’ lifestyle
Therefore the onus is directed toward the Christian, rather than the gay lifestyle which produced Aids
He embraced a lifestyle in opposition to God.
Prayers for a deeply misguided soul.
It would be better if it was the vaxx.
“The disease was renamed by Anthony Fauci so as to reduce the “stigma”.”
You serious or is that a joke?
I had already suspected that Jim and Tammy were fakes then they had this guy on their show. I’m shocked more people did not catch on back then, but no they donated to those two clowns. Then several years later that time share scandal at Heritage USA happened. Like no one saw that coming?
Your first quotation from the Bible is very germane to this thread. Woe, indeed, to those who confuse good and evil and teach the same.
Perhaps you would like to supply a verse, or verses, that support the idea that God loves the sinner? I think you will find that God loves who he loves and hates who he chooses. For instance, He revealed that He “hated Esau”.
That last paragraph is a REAL stretch! (I will refer you back to your first paragraph.) There is ZERO Biblical evidence that indicates that Christians are to “embrace” the gay lifestyle. There is plenty of Biblical evidence that God views the gay lifestyle as rebellion against Him. (Hint: read about Sodom.)
I will point out to others reading this post that since God does not share who he hates, it behooves us to extend His love and His invitation of salvation to all without judging.
“Jesus loves me just the way I am. I really believe that. Jesus loves the way I love,” Pieters told Messner, after sharing his experience of coming out as gay and being hospitalized multiple times”.
This is just self-serving crap of the absolute worst kind. Who beside a delusional ass would buy this?
IThe CDC announced the name change in 1982, but Fauci was the main AIDs guy in the US Gov’t..
You got it almost right, cowboy. Jesus loves you. That's why He doesn't love you the way you are.
I'll pray for you. At the same time, your spiritual counter-example will be a warning to me--to renounce my own sins, rather than justifying them like a demented spoiled child. R.I.P.
““Jesus loves me just the way I am. I really believe that. Jesus loves the way I love,” Pieters told Messner,”
I’d have to say the Bible says God loves us as we are, but it also says we are to be transformed, not stay in our self made choices of sin, or things that happened to us out of our control and we then choose to stay in a sin repeating choice cycle.
sure it’s tough to get or stay free of some of them but we are too continually trust in the Lord and resist sin, the devil.
I never said nor even hinted Christians are to embrace the gay lifestyle.
Your post is a misconstrued rendering!
So the good Rev Pieters had an “i” for Peters.
EC
It’s like saying Jesus loves Charles Manson, Ted Bundy and Adolf Hitler, just the way they are.
I had no idea that guy had been around that long. Of course back then I would not have paid attention.
Truth be told we were more scared of AIDS than COVID.
I’m nowhere near a Bundy, Manson or Hitler but I’ve never thought for a second that “Jesus loves me as I am” I find the expression incredibly offensive. When we are judged we will be judged alone. Hitler won’t be in the room.
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