There's been a theme that has popped up in my life over and over again in this past year, and I'm not sure what to do with it. It began in January when I had a delightful and leisurely lunch date with my good friend Kelli in LA. She had come up to Pasadena to say goodbye before we moved to Seattle, and we found ourselves talking at length about the California Women's Conference that Maria Shriver organized. Kelli had the opportunity to attend in Oct. of 2010 and she told me story after story of incredible people who came to share their stories, experiences, and passion for seeing women around the world rise up, be given an education, be empowered to say no to sex slavery, have access to basic health care, and begin taking leadership in every area of society. She heard from women such as Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsberg about their experiences of rising to two of the highest positions in our country during an era that was skeptical about women in that type of leadership. She learned about the battles they had to fight along the way, the injustices they encountered because of their gender. Kelli heard from Laura Bush, Michelle Obama, Lisa Leslie, and a gentleman named Nick Kristof who co-wrote the book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide. I was fascinated. I had no idea a conference such as this existed, and that people around the world really were still fighting for women. And honestly, I really didn't realize just how badly women in some places in this world need people to be fighting for them.I moved to Seattle and we were thrown into 6 months of chaos where all I really thought about was how to keep my husband a teensy bit sane. I didn't really have energy for thinking, reading, or much else. Then, in May I found out I was pregnant and began learning about the nutrition I needed, the amount of water I should be drinking, the prenatal vitamins that would give my baby the extra vitamins he needed (okay, I knew enough to start taking these a few months before we started trying for a baby, so I already had this one under control), and the prenatal care I would be receiving through my health insurance. I realized how easy it all was. When I was hungry, I had a plethora of healthy options for snacks in my fridge. When I was thirsty (which I was ALL the time in the first few months), I had access to unlimited amounts of clean, filtered water. Because I had been taking prenatal vitamins for several months before trying to conceive, I knew that my baby's chances of having spina biffida from a lack of folic acid in my body were drastically lower than other women worldwide. I started feeling like this wasn't really fair, this wasn't right. Of course I was so grateful to have these resources readily available to me, but there were a few nights I sat down to dinner with tears in my eyes thinking of women who were just as pregnant, just as exhausted as I was having to walk miles for buckets of water to quench their thirst, and then haul them back to the house. Our baby was a conscious choice for us--sure he came along a bit faster than we expected, but we knew that financially we could care for him, and we were intentional about deciding we wanted to begin trying for a family. Thousands of women worldwide are pregnant with their 5th or 6th child because of gang rape, or because of complete lack of access to birth control or family planning education. I don't believe any child is a mistake, but I do realize there are hundreds of thousands of families worldwide struggling to feed the mouths they have, let alone provide for new ones. The injustice of all of this has hit me powerfully these past 7 months, and in the midst of this is when I picked up this book Kelli so highly recommended and dove into trying to understand what women were facing worldwide, and how to best empower them.
Half the Sky is a book everyone needs to add to their reading list, but instead of just adding it to our reading lists, we need to let this book change us. We need to begin opening our eyes to the plight of girls and women worldwide. This isn't just a question of whether we think women should be allowed to lead in government or politics or churches, these are life and death issues that face our sisters around the world. The number of women (and really, girls as young as 12) who die from malnutrition, childbirth, AIDS, who are sold into brothels to pay back the debts their family has incurred, is staggering. With the advent of the ultra sound, in several countries where families are struggling to survive, if they find out the baby is a girl they will abort her because she is deemed to be less valuable to the family. (One person Kristof and WuDunn interviewed joyfully exclaimed to them that "we don't have to have daughters anymore!") Girls are disappearing worldwide, in some countries only counting for 100 births to every 120 boys born (girls are either aborted or left to die upon birth because a family has "no use" for them). If that doesn't cause us outrage I have to wonder what in the world will??
The complete lack of voice and power women in some countries have is devastating to their societies. And it doesn't have to be that way! The main thesis of this book that Nicolas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (who won the Pulitzer prize for their journalistic work on this book by the way) put forth is that if we can educate a girl, entire societies can change. The United Nations Development Program summed up the research that is mounting worldwide about this as "Woman's empowerment helps raise economic productivity and reduce infant mortality. It contributes to improved health and nutrition. It increases the chances of education for the next generation." If girls could be kept in school, it's been proven that pregnancy rates drastically fall, and when a girl does marry and have children those children are taught to read and do basic math (since the moms are the ones raising the kids in the home), and those who are able to read have a much better chance of finding access to some other type of income for their families other than selling themselves. Just the pure act of being educated empowers girls to find their voices, to stand up to family members who try and insist on their being sold into marriage with men three times their age. Research is finding that there is a direct correlation between countries that nurture terrorists and those where women are most marginalized. The reason there are so many Muslim terrorists has little to do with the Koran (if you've read the Koran you know Islam is actually a peaceful religion) but rather it has a great deal to do with the lack of robust female participation in Islamic countries. In fact as our own Pentagon has gained a deeper understanding of counterterrorism, it has become increasingly interested in the grassroots projects such as girls' education. Empowering girls, some in our military would argue, would at least in part, disempower terrorists. We talk a lot about national security around here, what would happen if we put some of our energy into raising the standard of living for women and girls (and thus by default the boys born into those countries) in the countries we deem to be the greatest threats to the US at least just a little?
I don't think this is an issue our churches can continue to ignore. What I loved about this book is that its not hard to read. It's not super academic in style, it's full of individual women's stories, and stories of communities changed because of one young woman being empowered somehow. And there is an entire chapter on "how can we help?" with super practical ways--letter writing to our politicians who get to vote on international spending as well as including huge lists of organizations that are all doing something overseas surrounding the issues women face that we can partner with. I'm planning on starting to figure out the whole letter writing thing--what a simple thing we can all do from home to start urging members of our own government to begin paying more and more attention to what's happening worldwide. I wonder what would happen if a woman's ministry program at a church jumped on board with one of these organizations instead of planning another fashion show or movie night? What would happen if groups of women here in America read this book and decided to act? I'm ready to find out. Grab this book, read it, and pass it on to a friend. Our sisters around the world need someone to start advocating for them.
Half the Sky is a book everyone needs to add to their reading list, but instead of just adding it to our reading lists, we need to let this book change us. We need to begin opening our eyes to the plight of girls and women worldwide. This isn't just a question of whether we think women should be allowed to lead in government or politics or churches, these are life and death issues that face our sisters around the world. The number of women (and really, girls as young as 12) who die from malnutrition, childbirth, AIDS, who are sold into brothels to pay back the debts their family has incurred, is staggering. With the advent of the ultra sound, in several countries where families are struggling to survive, if they find out the baby is a girl they will abort her because she is deemed to be less valuable to the family. (One person Kristof and WuDunn interviewed joyfully exclaimed to them that "we don't have to have daughters anymore!") Girls are disappearing worldwide, in some countries only counting for 100 births to every 120 boys born (girls are either aborted or left to die upon birth because a family has "no use" for them). If that doesn't cause us outrage I have to wonder what in the world will??
The complete lack of voice and power women in some countries have is devastating to their societies. And it doesn't have to be that way! The main thesis of this book that Nicolas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (who won the Pulitzer prize for their journalistic work on this book by the way) put forth is that if we can educate a girl, entire societies can change. The United Nations Development Program summed up the research that is mounting worldwide about this as "Woman's empowerment helps raise economic productivity and reduce infant mortality. It contributes to improved health and nutrition. It increases the chances of education for the next generation." If girls could be kept in school, it's been proven that pregnancy rates drastically fall, and when a girl does marry and have children those children are taught to read and do basic math (since the moms are the ones raising the kids in the home), and those who are able to read have a much better chance of finding access to some other type of income for their families other than selling themselves. Just the pure act of being educated empowers girls to find their voices, to stand up to family members who try and insist on their being sold into marriage with men three times their age. Research is finding that there is a direct correlation between countries that nurture terrorists and those where women are most marginalized. The reason there are so many Muslim terrorists has little to do with the Koran (if you've read the Koran you know Islam is actually a peaceful religion) but rather it has a great deal to do with the lack of robust female participation in Islamic countries. In fact as our own Pentagon has gained a deeper understanding of counterterrorism, it has become increasingly interested in the grassroots projects such as girls' education. Empowering girls, some in our military would argue, would at least in part, disempower terrorists. We talk a lot about national security around here, what would happen if we put some of our energy into raising the standard of living for women and girls (and thus by default the boys born into those countries) in the countries we deem to be the greatest threats to the US at least just a little?
I don't think this is an issue our churches can continue to ignore. What I loved about this book is that its not hard to read. It's not super academic in style, it's full of individual women's stories, and stories of communities changed because of one young woman being empowered somehow. And there is an entire chapter on "how can we help?" with super practical ways--letter writing to our politicians who get to vote on international spending as well as including huge lists of organizations that are all doing something overseas surrounding the issues women face that we can partner with. I'm planning on starting to figure out the whole letter writing thing--what a simple thing we can all do from home to start urging members of our own government to begin paying more and more attention to what's happening worldwide. I wonder what would happen if a woman's ministry program at a church jumped on board with one of these organizations instead of planning another fashion show or movie night? What would happen if groups of women here in America read this book and decided to act? I'm ready to find out. Grab this book, read it, and pass it on to a friend. Our sisters around the world need someone to start advocating for them.
