In the course of the implementation of ICPD Program of Action Faith-Based Organizations (FBOs) were acknowledged by UNFPA as important and undeniable agents of change that can become active promoters and supporters to UNFPA and its activities, thus effectively contributing to success of projects envisaged within the framework of UNFPA main program areas including Reproductive Health, Women’s Empowerment, and Population and Development Strategies.
Success Story based on the recent experience of cooperation with Armenian FBOs
Faith and Spirituality help overcome Gender Violence: Couple re-untied after 7 Years
“Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate” (Mathew 19: 6)
It would be difficult for Parandzem to imagine that after seven years of divorce she will re-unite with her former husband, and moreover – expect a child.
Seven years ago she separated from him because of violence and indifference in the family. The reason, in her opinion, was not the lack of love but interference of her mother-in-law, and her husband’s blind loyalty to his mother.
“Once, during an awareness session within the framework of “Armenian Church against Gender Violence” project that was implemented within my community I spoke about God’s fair justice and eternal life, love in the family, violence, and Peace that one may reach through constantly feeling the presence of the Hand of God” – says Father Gevorg Kertikashyan, one of more than 40 priests representing Armenian Apostolic and Catholic churches’ dioceses who participated in the joint project of UNFPA with “Armenia Inter-Church Charitable Round Table Foundation of the World Council of Churches” ecumenical faith-based-organization (FBO).
After a few days, Parandzem called Father Kertikashyan and met him for a confession. After several meetings with her, the Priest met with her husband. The meetings became frequent, and after a while, Parandzem and her former husband started meeting Father Kertikashyan together. “In a result of tireless prayers and meetings they joined together on November 21 of 2010, and will have a child due to their faith and love of God” – concludes Father Kertikashyan.
Faith and Spirituality as Guidelines for Action to Combat Gender-Based Violence in Armenia
In the course of the implementation of UNFPA International Conference on Population and Developm
ent (ICPD) Program of Action Faith-Based Organizations (FBOs) were acknowledged by UNFPA as important and undeniable agents of change that have a great potential for transforming societies; this is due to the fact that about 70% of the world’s population identify themselves as belonging to a religious or spiritual community, with their lives influenced to a certain extent by religious values and practices.
Today, FBOs are willingly engaging in numerous activities and events that pave the way to fulfillment of ICPD Programme of Action goals and objectives, and their participation increases trust of population towards initiatives undertaken by UNFPA.
In Armenia, throughout centuries, the Church has been playing a leading role in fostering education and moral values in Armenian society. Religious institutions provided spiritual and ethical stewardship to families, promoted and disseminated knowledge and humanism among population. However, modern Armenian families have lots of pressing concerns, with gender-based violence (GBV) in the first place that need to be addressed to ensure harmonious development of society. GBV is one of the critical problems present in Armenia society as lots of women suffer from stigma associated with this phenomenon that prohibits reporting violence and bringing “family matters” into public domain. Those women who nonetheless try to break the wall of silence and protect themselves in most cases face social isolation and rejection.
In order to effectively address the issue of GBV in Armenian families and to promote understanding of the scope of this problem among priests working with parishioners, UNFPA in cooperation with the ecumenical organization “Armenia Inter-Church Charitable Round Table Foundation of the World Council of Churches” FBO (ART) launched in 2009 a 2-year project that was implemented within the framework of the UNFPA “Combating Gender-Based Violence in the South Caucasus” (UNFPA CGBV) initiative and was completed in the end of 2010. ART was founded in 1996 on the initiative of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the World Council of Churches, with the participation of the Armenian Catholic and Armenian Evangelical Churches. It brings together Armenian churches, local NGOs, and Church-related partners with a shared commitment to working together to address some of the fundamental social and economic problems of the country and has previous positive experience of cooperation with UN agencies in Armenia in the fields of HIV/AIDS prevention and anti-trafficking. These factors make ART an outstanding partner for cooperation and implementation of joint initiatives involving FBOs.
Among other goals, the project aimed at increasing awareness of Armenian priests on ICPD issues and promoting their active involvement in combating GBV. In particular, one of the anticipated outcomes of the project was to enable the clergy to conduct awareness raising on GBV issues among population and to address the root causes of violence against women and girls, gender inequality and discrimination.
The project had several stages of implementation that allowed gradually building knowledge on GBV issues among priests to lead to further development and implementation of Action Plans for effective work with parishioners and provision of counseling to victims of violence.
The four stages of project implementation were:
- Elaboration of a manuals/guidelines on Christian understanding of anti-GBV approaches for the priests to address GBV related issues during their services, and meetings with school children
- Capacity building trainings for clergy and development of plans to be implemented in the communities
- Implementation of “Action Plans” in the communities they serve;
- Cooperation with Christian Education Center of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin for delivering courses on GBV prevention for schools children and their parents.
The elaborated manual has become a unique learning tool created in cooperation with ART to enable the priests to actively engage in combating and preventing GBV by means of:
• Conducting meetings with the couples that held engagement ceremonies in churches and discussions with the parishioners on the issues of gender equality from the Church perspective;
• Incorporating gender aspects in discussions with the couples preparing to marry;
• Providing pastoral counseling/support to the victims of GBV;
• Delivering courses on GBV issues in the schools based on the specially designed curriculum;
• Creating and strengthening network and collaboration of priests and stakeholders working in the field of combating GBV.
The manual was published and widely disseminated through the channels the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. However, the publication was specifically targeted at the audience of clergy and couldn’t address the needs of the parishioners. In order to fill up this gap, a brochure, lighter version of manual with adapted language and information, was published within the framework of UNFPA CGBV and disseminated to parishioners by the priests involved in the project .
By the end of 2009, over 40 priests representing Armenian Apostolic and Catholic churches’ dioceses participated in capacity building, management and networking trainings and as a result by the end of 2010, 11 action plans were implemented by priests for approximately 300 parishioners in each of the participating communities. An important aspect of the work with parishioners that required special skills and understanding of the scope of GBV problem became pastoral counseling and support to victims of GBV that the priests were able to provide. The fact that the Church itself addressed its parishioners with a message of stopping violence in families and restoring peace and love, greatly increased trust and readiness of community members to share their GBV related concerns with and to seek support from the priests as well as to participate in Church services and lectures on GBV related topics. Awareness raising meetings helped to identify the families with GBV problems, thus providing an opportunity to the relevant clergy to work with family members on individual basis. In one of the regions two divorced couples separately attended a series of project workshops, and started to seek individual pastoral counseling from the priest regarding their family problems. As a result of the counseling peace and understanding within the couples were restored; since then, the project clergy pays regular visits to marz to provide counseling on Christian principles of family well-being. Another successful experience relates to the case when the priest helped a woman who has been turned out of her house, to claim back her property and family rights by referring her to the proper legal entity as well as provided psychological counseling helping her to overcome negative impacts of the stress she has been through. Also, a thematic exhibition “Violence through the Eyes of Children” was organized to present drawings of the high school students who participated in the project events and attended courses delivered by the priests.
The added-value of Action Plans implementation by the clergy was the presentation of the Church perspective on equal roles of women and men in the family and stressing the importance of “gender equality and equity” by Armenian Apostolic Church. Elaboration of the Manual for priests and a brochure for parishioners with references to the Christianity in general and particularly, the Armenian Church’s contribution for family love and peace, as well as testimonies from the Holy Bible, helped to explain the strategic message of Armenian Church about “unity in differences”, where differences do not imply any subordination or superiority between men and women. Need for improving networking among the clergy increased a general level of interest and participation in the capacity building stage, while linking the capacity building topics to everyday pastoral work of the priests and their pastoral experience added up to the momentum and enthusiasm in the course of the project implementation.
Overall, the project demonstrated that a strong interest and pro-activeness of the FBO and priests of Armenian churches for partnership with UNFPA in the selected thematic areas were crucial for the successful implementation of the project activities.
