Ghana: Churchs Sensitized to Respond to Sexual And Gender Based Violence

Fikre Debela
12/05/08

Women are subject to inequality all over the world. Society tends to give men a boost up while women are left behind. However, what happens when this idea is reinforced by something that people look up to. In Ghana there have been cases of church’s using the Holy Word to reinforce the idea of submission to the husband in violent way. The church is suppose to be a place of comfort, somewhere people can go to get positive answers but quoting scriptures to reinforce domestic violence is wrong. Gender inequality in these situations have to be stopped, not only because its hurts the women but is shaming the church.
Domestic Violence among women and children is a form of inequality. For example there is a widespread belief that a husband is subject to intercourse with his wife at any time, even by force. This is certainly not true. When the Bible speaks of submission to ones husband it is not speaking of this but in other terms that are positive. People tend to justify their motives by twisting words meant for something else. Programmes that commit to women and children's rights such as NGO and the ARK foundation have worked to raise issues about Sexual and Gender based violence. The ARK had held fifty church forums to raise the issue of domestic violence and bring the truth to light.
It really is not fair when places that a person trust tells them otherwise. Though this isn’t the case for the majority, it really does effect the few. I think its good that awareness is trying to be raised about gender based violence.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200812050743.html