Cofield’s Heroic Acts Of Compassion Remembered

Alonzo Harvin remembered a ​“mother figure” who got him off drugs. Mabel Mincey remembered the caring pioneer who came to the hospital when her daughter was suffering with AIDS, back when most people didn’t know or want to know how to help.

Harvey and Mincey were among the hundreds people who came to pay their respects this weekend for a woman who changed lives and saved lives through love, compassion, and a sense of service that knew no bounds.

Cofield died on March 17 at age 92. In an era when perhaps too many people are designated heroes, Elsie Cofield was the real deal. At a time when the city’s black churches were hardly acknowledging the HIV/AIDS afflicted in their own midst, let alone ministering to them, Cofield kept the flame of humanity alive through founding the AIDS Interfaith Network (AIN) in 1987 in the basement of the church during the darkest early days of the epidemic. After a 30-year career as a teacher, she became the go-to person in New Haven during the epidemic and ultimately a leader acknowledged nationally and internationally with awards for her service.

On Friday, more than 300 people alike visited City Hall, where Cofield’s body lay in repose — the first person to be afforded that honor since former Mayor Biagio DiLieto’s death in 1999.

Then on Saturday more than 600 people attended Cofield’s funeral at Immanuel Baptist Missionary Church on Chapel Street, where she had served with her pastor husband Dr. Curtis Cofield for decades.Through hymns of hallelujah and faith, they said thank you.

And they told their stories of how Elsie Cofield touched their lives.

Lonnie and Alonzo

Lonnie B. Groom and Alonzo Harvin told how of how they met when they both attended AIN’s 9 a.m. to 5p.m. day center, a refuge for HIV/AIDS patients that Cofield first set up in 1987 in the basement of the church and then later moved, because the numbers of clients were growing, to a now torn-down adjacent building on the site of the church’s current parking lot.

They were both in tears as they recollected what Elsie Cofield and that day center meant to them. Harvin, now 55, said he came to New Haven from Bridgeport in 1997. Three days after his arrival, on a tip from someone, he became what he called a ​“member” of AIN.

“I never saw nothing like that, one person with so much love for everybody. She was like a mother figure. As time went by and I turned to drugs, she [eventually] got me off drugs. She was like this heavenly angel — housing, spiritual help, someone to talk to. There was always a number to call. I had more love from her than I had from my own mother or grandmother.”

Groom’s mother knew Elsie Cofield. He became involved with AIN at a time when, he said, ​“There were so many sick people that she [Cofield] had to get a larger space” for the day centerr.

“I was going through drug addiction and she was always a parental figure,” he said as he held back tears. ​“She made us feel we didn’t have to be ashamed. And I feel that way to this day. She helped me get my life back together. It’s not perfect, but I’m on my way.”

“It was like a family,” Harvin added, in an effort to describe the spirit of community inside the day center, a refuge from fear and stigma. ​“Once the doors closed, it was like we were regular people. A place just for us, people living with the virus. She had people come in [to talk to us], speakers, chiropractors, nutritionists, speakers on the latest drug [treatments].”

“She taught us, ​‘Don’t let this beat you. That you are not the disease,” added Harvin, who was associated with the center for 11 years.

“She’d talk to us like regular people, no shame. There’s other people doing worse, she would say. Like ​‘Lonzo said, she’ll be in my heart till the day I die,” said Groom.

“Do You Really Want To Be On The Front Lines?

One of those people helping Groom and Harvin was Yusuf Shah, who worked for Cofield (and also served as a West River alder). Shah recollected that Cofield had a more than persuasive way of reaching out to you, particularly since, as a Muslim, he would be an important addition to the growing interfaith group helping, first and foremost, African-American HIV/AIDS patients, but anyone who walked in the doors.

“I was the first Muslim employee,” recalled Shah, who is now retired, recalled. ​“She called me and said, ​‘Yusuf, I hear you’re doing incredible work. Do you really want to be on the front lines? Do you want to make a difference?’”

So saying, she proceeded to recruit Shah to work as a case manager at AIN. He met with her the following day. In short order she reminded him that he had to give two weeks notice to his current, soon to be former, employer.

“Once you sat down with Elsie Cofield, you were in,” Shah recalled.

When he professed that he knew nothing about AIDS, she replied, ​“You’re doing what we need” as a case manager at job at the Family Alliance. She said she’d teach him all he needed to know about the disease.

Shah, who worked at AIN for seven years, recalled dark days when ​“I had to do final arrangements, [because] peoples’ families wouldn’t bury them.”

“Mommy’s Babies”

One of the mysteries of Elsie Cofield, that people’s recollections and formal remarks tried to plumb, was the source of her bottomless compassion and generosity. An intimate view on that came from Bonnye Cofield, the current executive director of AIN [it no longer has a functioning building but still runs programs], and one of Elsie and Curtis Cofield’s four children.

Cofield said her mother used to call AIN’s clients ​“Mommy’s Babies.”

“I had to fight for my place [for mom’s love],” Bonnye Cofield recalled at the wake, which was also like a homecoming or reunion, full of hugs, tears, and remembered profound affections.

“As soon as she hit the door of the Elsie W. Cofield Day Center, she had to stop to speak to everyone,” Bonnye Cofield remembered. ​“Every single one [of the clients as well as the staff], and not a quick hi. It was love or a hug, or a how are you? And then she’d come up to me [in the office] and give me the word. Mentor me.

“She made sure she had love for all of us,” Cofield recalled, but she did point to one day when she was young and in need of something more. ​“I was 12,and I walked in [to AIN the office] and said: ​‘Do I have to make an appointment with my parents?’”

She said her parents chuckled, but shortly thereafter they both spirited their young daughter off to lunch.

Adding to the ​“Sum of Human Joy”

At Saturday’s funeral, Mabel Mincey never went to the dais. She was sitting in the back row of the sanctuary and taking in the service.

“I had a daughter who was infected with the virus, in 1989,” she recalled.

“She [Elsie Cofield] gave us a lot of support” during the year that her daughter was associated with AIN.

“She was the type of person who always had time for you, day or night, at home, or at the hospital. Sometimes the hospital wasn’t friendly with our patients,” said Mincey.

Then she recalled one specific night: ​“AIDS at that time was very new to the doctors and nurses. Once they knew you had it, they didn’t take much time with you because they knew you would die. But Elsie and her husband would come [to the hospital], and then our loved ones could stay as long as they had to.”

Mincey said her daughter has since passed away. Mincey was there at Immanuel Baptist, along with 600 others Saturday morning, to say, through hymns of hallelujah and faith, thank you.

After the service, a cortege of black cars transported Elsie Cofield to the Beaverdale Memorial Park cemetery, where she was buried.

Official Obituary:

Here below is the formal obituary released by the family:
Dr. Elsie Watson Cofield went home to be with the Lord peacefully departing this earth with dignity and grace on March 17,2016 surrounded by her loving family. For a blissful 61 years Mrs. Cofield was the loving and devoted wife of the Rev. Dr. Curtis McKinley Cofield, longtime pastor of Immanuel Missionary Baptist Church.

Together Elsie and Curtis were an inseparable team who established a reputation as champions of the dispossessed. In the summer of 1987, shortly after her retirement as a career educator, she became aware of the gap in programs and resources for Black people suffering with AIDS as opposed to others. In 1988 along with her husband Rev. Dr. Curtis M. Cofield, she created the AIDS Interfaith Network, Inc. As a result of her years of dedication working with her clients, she became referred to as Mother Theresa!

Throughout AIN’s history, Founder and President Emeritus, Elsie Cofield has accepted numerous awards and accolades on behalf of her work with AIN. Although all accolades have been highly regarded, among the most prestigious was the invitation Elsie, Board Chairman, and Executive Director, received to be invited to the Legislative Chamber of the White House where she witnessed The President of the United States of America, Bill Clinton, sign a bill to grant an extra $1.56 million dollars for services to Black communities as he acknowledged an ​“AIDS emergency” among the African American community and other minorities. During that ceremony, President Clinton declared AIDS a ​“National Emergency”!
During her years as instructor for the International Association of Minister’s Wives and Widows. 

She authored and began using her published material, ” AIDS In the Black Church”. Shortly thereafter, Elsie was invited to sit on an international council to address the HIV/AIDS conference by South African President, Nelson Mandela. Numerous international servants and celebrities were in attendance. Most notable, the Dhali Llama.

Elsie and Curtis were recognized by the City of New Haven with streets in their names, Elsie Cofield way and Rev. Curtis Cofield Corner. Left to carry on her legacy, two daughters, Judge E. Curtissa Cofield, retired, Bonnye M. Cofield; one son Curtis (Michelle) McKinley Cofield III, eight grandchildren and eleven great grandchildren; one sister, three brothers, one sister-in-law and a host of cherished friends and relatives.
Mrs. Cofield will lie in state at the City Hall 165 Church St., New Haven, CT on March 25, 2016 from 4 to 7pm where her legacy will be celebrated by the community and dignitaries, including Gov. Daniel Malloy and the honorable Mayor Toni Harp. A celebration of her life will take place Saturday, March 26, 2016 at 10AM, at Immanuel Baptist Church, 1324 Chapel St., New Haven, CT., with a calling hour at the church from 9AM- 10AM. To leave a message of comfort to the Cofield family, please visit www.hkhfuneralservices.com