Thursday, December 18, 2008 5:46 p.m. CST
BY CHERYL WITTENAUER/The Associated Press
ST. LOUIS — Sickle cell researchers in St. Louis say they've significantly increased blood donations to fight the disease with appeals targeted at predominantly black church congregations in the city.
Blacks have tended not to donate blood, they said, but the St. Louis program appears to have changed some minds.
Michael DeBaun, a sickle-cell disease specialist at St. Louis Children's Hospital, launched Sickle Cell Sabbath and blood donation drives five years ago at 13 predominantly black churches in St. Louis.
On Sundays from February to June, the congregations learned about the disease and treatment benefits of blood transfusions and bone marrow transplants. Church-sponsored blood drives were encouraged.
Of the nearly 700 donors who participated in blood drives, 422, or 60 percent, were first-time donors.
Results of the study are published in the advance online publication of the journal Transfusion.
Now I chose this one for Good News Tuesday because I always thought the church in particular black churches got an unfair shake when it came to community woes.
It seem like we blame the church for not doing enough to address certain issues within the community, when the church through it's teachings does just that, we just choose not to listen.
I mean think about.
Church says do not have premarital sex or commit adultery, we choose to ignore that.
Thus we choose to have out of wed lock children, broken hearts, HIV, crime (mostly committed by single men and women), delinquent kids, and so on.
Than we blame the church when Junebug the bastard child of Betty, (who slept with a married Pat), gets 13 year old Shelia pregnant, (who caught Herpes from 21 year old Tyrone who caught it from Betty), decides he is going to shoot Brother Pat for not paying for the cocaine he fronted him, which Pat used to get high with and screw Bernice, Shelia's mother, who is the cousin of Denise, Pat's wife who is now sleeping with Tyrone.
Get it?
Now I don't want to get on a soap box on Good News Tuesday, but I figure I should explain why I chose this.
This is the type of church activity I would like to see more of.
The type that addresses community concerns that are not covered in the good book.
Spread the news to your church.
