Suddenly in the African-American community there is growing awareness of a vast epidemic of AIDS cases across the United States, and black denominations and organizations are leading the charge.

It is estimated that 300,000 to 500,000 African-Americans are already infected with the HIV virus. Further, more African-American children are infected with HIV than children of all other races and ethnicities combined.

We have all heard of the devastation caused by AIDS in Africa, but these statistics indicate the U.S. black population is also approaching a disaster. By the year 2005, scholars at the Harvard AIDS Institute estimate that 60 percent of all AIDS cases in the United States will be among African-Americans.

And the numbers continue to rise. Every day, nearly 100 black Americans are diagnosed with AIDS, the institute has found. The disease has no respect for gender; African-American women now constitute two-thirds of all cases of women with HIV reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

These numbers come to us through the Balm in Gilead, a national organization dedicated to bringing to the black community a better awareness of the AIDS threat, how people can avoid being infected and what churches, foundations and government can do to ease the epidemic and care for people.

Pernessa Seele, the founder and CEO of Balm in Gilead, said many black churches have been slow to respond to the AIDS epidemic, "allowing stigma, ignorance and silence to prevail."

And when black churches don't respond by educating their members, that means the black community remains uninformed and the numbers continue to rise. That's because 80 percent of the black community is affiliated with a black church, according to the group.

"When we talk about mobilizing the black community, we are, in effect, talking about mobilizing the black church," Seele said.

Balm in Gilead takes its name from a passage in the Book of Jeremiah in the Old Testament. It is the only national organization that works exclusively to educate and organize African-American churches to address the AIDS crisis.

Seele and her organization hope to enlist the participation of thousands of black churches for the seventh annual Black Church Week of Prayer for the Healing of AIDS March 1-7.

Balm in Gilead is supported by the seven largest African-American denominations with a combined membership of 24 million people. The organization also has received a grant from Hoffmann-La Roche, a leading pharmaceutical company.

The week of prayer will consist of meetings that will resemble old-time revivals filled with singing, preaching and prayer. And because black churches hold spirituality and social action in close proximity, the week should spur some activity.

But the task is daunting. Not only have black churches failed to educate their membership about the HIV virus and the AIDS epidemic in their midst, but they also too often have shied away from caring for those dying of AIDS and their families, organizers say.

While working in a hospital in New York City, for example, Seele noticed that small African-American children dying of AIDS had no visits from their pastors, no flowers on their tables and no prayers being said for them in their congregations. She went to pastors of black churches and asked why they had abandoned their people. Then she organized the first Week of Prayer for the Healing of AIDS in Harlem.

Julia Walker, communications specialist for Balm in Gilead, said the black community ignored the growing AIDS epidemic for years.

"First, you have to look at how AIDS came into the public consciousness as a homosexual disease," Walker said. "So the black church said, ÔWell, that's not us. It's a white homosexual disease.' But when we look at AIDS now, it is essentially a black disease."

Walker said AIDS in the black community is primarily transmitted through intravenous drug use. At the same time, heterosexual infection rates are skyrocketing.

"We believe Ñ we're hearing from doctors we work with Ñ that for 1997 the Centers for Disease Control will report the rates of new infections among people over the age of 55 will be equal to or greater than the rates for transmission for black teen-agers," Walker said.

The Week of Prayer for the Healing of AIDS seeks to create a friendly environment for people with AIDS and for the discussion of AIDS issues.

"The church has to give permission to people to become active," Walker said. "Look at what happened in the civil rights struggle. The church had to say it was good to get involved."

Clark D. Morphew