In Honor of Mom

Women around the world are models of strength and perserverance. In spite of the fact that they along with their children suffer disproportionately the effects of poverty and hunger, women nonetheless

+ produce an estimated half of the world's food;
+ are responsible for about 60-80% of food crops in the developing world;
+ and are more likely to spend their income on the wellbeing of their children--buying more nutritious food, purchasing school supplies, and paying for healthcare.

For this reason, women are key players in the fight against hunger and poverty. Consider the following facts.

+ Women's education has the greatest effect on reducing child malnutrition, accounting for 43% of the reduction in malnutrition in the developing world from 1970-1995.
+ In India's economic transformation, the states with the highest percentage of women in the labor force grew the fastest and had the largest reductions in poverty.
+ The total value of women's unpaid house and farm work adds one-third to the world's gross national product.

ELCA World Hunger recognizes the importance of supporting women in our efforts to combat hunger and poverty here and abroad. Your gifts to the World Hunger Appeal can (among other things) finance a micro-credit loan to woman to start a business or buy a machine to spin wool to increase her productivity. As you celebrate your mom this weekend, consider empowering other women around the globe with a Good Gift.

David Creech

All statistics in this post were taken from the Bread for the World Institute's 2009 Hunger Report, pp. 60-67.

Women's rights

Women's rights are always of concern to ELCA World Hunger. Education, land ownership, access to credit - all of these things provide the means to make a living, and all of these things are often denied to women. Unsurprisingly, women suffer a disproportionate amount of hunger and poverty compared to men.

As a white woman living in the United States, I've always recognized that an accident of birth has allowed me access to power structures that many women in the world don't have. Such luck to be born here and now! But two things I've read in the past week have alerted me to just how much the "now" matters.
The first comes from Dreamers of the Day, an historical novel by Mary Doria Russell. She describes an unmarried schoolteacher living in Ohio in 1920:

"Well, at the end of the war, women had achieved the suffrage, but the Nineteenth Amendment didn't carry with it the right to make a living. There were so many demobilized soldiers needing work that we ladies were often summarily dismissed from employment."

Can you imagine the lawsuits that would occur now? Yet that was the state of the country within the lifetime of people I have known. It really was not that long ago.

The second item comes from a blurb about Women's History Month (which is now, in March):

"1974's Equal Credit Opportunity Act gave married women the right to have credit cards and bank loans in their own name. Prior to that, in many states, wives had to defer to their husbands for credit card use, and women had to have a male cosigner to get a loan."

1974!! That's within my lifetime! I had no idea that, at the time I was born, my mother could not have her own credit card! One could look at these things and despair at how long it has taken for women's rights to get to where they are, and how far they have to go. But I take heart on the flip side. Look how deeply embedded these rights have become in our society in such a relatively short time, and what a wonderfully important difference they have made.

And the fight for women's rights goes on! To read more about VERY current affairs and ongoing work on the topic, I encourage you to read the Ecumenical Women blog. Emily Davila, the Assistant Director at the Lutheran Office for World Community in New York, says there's a lot of interesting posting going on right now from the Commission on the Status of Women. Learn more and lend your voice so that opportunity for women doesn't depend on birth place and time.

-Nancy Michaelis

Education and Women's Rights in Papua New Guinea

The following was written by Emily Davila, Assistant Director, Lutheran Office for World Community.

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I spent the last week in Papua New Guinea - not something I ever expected to do! With over 800 languages, communication in PNG is fascinating. There is no internet and even phones are hard to come by, a few cell phones are here and there. Most people I met promised to write me - as in a letter. We will see how that goes.

I went to PNG as an invited guest to a Lutheran women’s conference. Colonized by Germans, more than one-fifth of the country is Lutheran. One of the key features of the conference was a bible study called “Jesus Liberates women in PNG from male dominated cultures.”

Growing up, Pastor Michael, a seminary professor, watched his mother suffer in a polygamous marriage. His father, a “bigman” would forceably take the pigs she raised so that he could enjoy a high status in the community, beating her if necessary. When menstruating, women were (and still are in some places) secluded, and some believe that even the food they touch is contaminated so they are not allowed to cook meals. After the age of 13, Michael was discouraged from spending time with his mother. Because of a tradition called the “Bride price” -similar to a dowry- a woman cannot divorce her husband because her family is expected to pay the money back. By paying for their wives, it encourages a culture where many men consider their wives a possession. In the case of Michael's sister, despite the fact that she was often beaten by her husband, culturally, it was impossible to divorce him and she eventually committed suicide.

All this caused Pastor Michael to read the bible searching for stories of women’s liberation. At the conference he distributed a 60-page book written in Pidgin (the national language) and English that systematically unwraps the stories of women in the bible to deliver a message of respect and encouragement for women’s leadership. It ends with a chapter: “Jesus’ approach to the Samaritan Women (and others) could be a model for PNG men to follow." Some of the suggestions:
-PNG men should put aside their beliefs of gender-based concepts of clean and unclean…
-Women ought to be given equal invitation and opportunity for leadership roles in the church
-Women should be given equal theological education…
-Women should be ordained

Now - the format of this communication was not modern: it came in a dense booklet - footnotes - even the original greek in some cases. But he systematically made the argument for gender equality in a country where it is an urgent life or death issue with one of the highest infant and maternal death rates in the world. He took nearly 8 hours over four days to deliver his lecture to 1,000 women and some men, including high ranking pastors and the Bishop.

But this is an oral culture, so the women may not read this thesis booklet. But they will remember his new interpretations of the Samaritan woman and the woman at the well, and they will take it home to their villages and retell the stories. They asked him to address the synod meeting next year, which will be mainly men, and hopefully this will happen. In a male-dominated culture, it will help women gain credibility to have a man - and the Bible - speaking on their behalf.

I think this was a historic occasion in PNG, and it speaks to the power of education. He went to school and chose to study this subject, and is now preaching a new gospel in his own language in a country that is hungry for it. The “West” cannot export gender equality, it has to come from the grassroots within. PNG is a very religious country. They have mixed Christianity with their own beliefs and it permeates almost everything they do. I can’t think of a more credible way for a gender equality movement to gain foothold in this country.