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Churches accused of ignoring or condoning violence against women By Stephen Brown Ecumenical News International Tuesday, December 1, 1998 Harare, Zimbabwe - Churches around the world are ignoring and even condoning violence against women, a major global gathering of Christian women has been told. During a special hearing held as part of a festival in Harare to mark the conclusion of the Ecumenical Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women, women spoke publicly about the abuse and violence that they had suffered, including within churches. They told of sexual abuse by clergy, of the unwillingness of churches to support women who had left violent marriages, and of victimization and rejection by predominantly-male church structures. The hearing, which took place on November 28, was one of the first open debates at an international ecumenical gathering about violence against women. The gathering is considering a series of recommendations to put to the eighth assembly of the World Council of Churches, which launched the Ecumenical Decade in 1988. The WCC assembly opens here on December 3. The hearing, which wove together liturgy, worship, accounts of suffering and of attempts to tackle the issue of violence, culminated in an act of healing by Chung Hyun Kyung, a Korean who now teaches at Union Theological Seminary, New York, intended to lead women from "crucifixion to resurrection." Drawing on Korea's "shaman tradition," a traditional form of Korean spirituality which has now been taken over by Christian women in Korea, the healing act combined music, drama and meditation. Experiences of exclusion Opening the hearing, Irja Askola, a Finnish Lutheran woman working on the women's desk of the Conference of European Churches in Geneva, and one of the main organizers of the hearing, said that it had become "very obvious" during the Ecumenical Decade that "violence against women in our societies and in our churches" was a significant issue. "We know now that our churches, we as churches, have not only ignored this issue, but have sometimes even sustained it by misusing the Bible and the authority of the pulpit". She referred to the results of a series of team visits to the WCC's member churches to discuss the Ecumenical Decade. Altogether 75 teams, each composed of two men and two women, visited more than 300 churches and 650 women's groups around the world. All the teams reported that violence against women was a major challenge facing the churches. According to a document presented at the hearing, the teams also reported "the total insensitivity of many church leaders to this concern". Askola told the gathering: "My hope and desire is that church leaders getting together will condemn violence against women as a sin." During the hearing five women related their experiences of exclusion, violence and abuse. Olivia Juarez de Gonzalez, an indigenous woman from Mexico, spoke of the violence suffered by indigenous women in Latin America; Ann Smith, an Anglican priest from Canada, said she had been sexually abused as a child by her father, an Anglican priest. In her late teens and early 20s he forced her to join a fundamentalist cult which subjected her to ritual abuse; Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz, a theologian from the United States, described the marginalization of women-centered theologies and women theologians as a form of violence. Rebecca Alman, a Roman Catholic from Papua New Guinea, and now coordinator of the Women's Crisis Center in Wewak, in the northeast of the country, spoke of how, 22 years ago, she left her husband after suffering six years of domestic violence, and started living with another man. Since then she has not been able to receive holy communion as the Catholic Church has not annulled her violent marriage. Susan Adams, from Aotearoa-New Zealand, spoke of institutional violence towards women by male-dominated church structures even in churches which declare a belief in gender equality, inclusiveness and openness to the contribution of women. Responses But as well as testimonies of suffering, there were also accounts of attempts by churches to tackle the issue.
He vowed "to challenge any attempts to cover up" violence against women, saying that the "sickness of our churches feeds on complacency and self-righteousness, and utterly misplaced efforts at self-justification, especially by men." "The Ecumenical Decade has helped uncover these defensive strategies, and its momentum must not be lost." He added: "Violence is an expression of male culture which for too long has been condoned by churches." Speaking to ENI after the hearing, Askola said that the "silence has been broken. There's no way the ecumenical movement can ignore the issue." Churches had to begin by recognizing that, by ignoring the fact of violence against women, "we have rejected a lot of the victims, but - even worse - we have justified a lot of violence against women." "The first thing is to recognize, to admit, to do our own homework. Only after that can we speak with a prophetic voice. We cannot be a prophetic voice until we have taken this first step." |
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