wfn.org | Churches Accused of Ignoring Violence Against Women

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4-January-1999 
98402 
 
    Churches Accused of Ignoring or Condoning 
    Violence Against Women 
 
    by Stephen Brown 
    Ecumenical News International 
 
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 Nov. 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 Dec. 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. 
 
    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," Askola said. 
 
    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. 
 
    But as well as testimonies of suffering, there were also accounts of 
attempts by churches to tackle the issue. 
 
    Responding to the accounts of violence, the WCC's general secretary, 
Konrad Raiser, a German Protestant theologian - and the only man on the 
platform - said that they demonstrated that "our church needs healing, but 
only a church that admits its sickness can be healed." 
 
    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." Raiser said, adding that "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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