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Lutheran delegation advocates at UN commission on women

NEW YORK, Lutheran Office for World Community - March 2007:
Hailing from Brazil, Indonesia and Germany, three delegates represented the Lutheran World Federation at the recent UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

The three pastors joined more than 1,600 other delegates from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) attending the meeting, which reviews governmental progress on programs and policies that promote the advancement of women. The representatives worked in caucuses and met with their governments to influence the 'agreed conclusions', which is the outcome document of the commission.

For the first time in history, more than 200 girls from around the world came to commission, to share their voices on the theme of "elimination of violence and discrimination against the girl child". The LWF is particularly interested in the theme because of the study guide it produced in 2001, "Churches Say 'NO' to Violence Against Women". This action plan for churches was published in response to the "Ecumenical Decade: Churches in Solidarity with Women" from 1988-1998.

The LWF sends representatives to the meeting every year, both to learn from the process and bring their grassroots experience and faith-based perspective to the UN.

From Indonesia, Rev. Sondang Napithulu, holds weekly meetings in her congregation for women and youth. In her region, women rarely hold leadership positions, and primarily influence decision-making behind the scenes through speaking with their husbands.

Often one of the only men in the room, Rev. Roger Schmidt, from Germany, is the newly-appointed officer of the LWF youth desk for church and society (YICAS). For the next four years he is tasked with assisting LWF member churches to include youth in their decision-making structures. As a delegate to the CSW, Pr. Schmidt has gained insight into how to do more to empower women and girls in institutional processes.

A feminist theologian, Rev. Elaine Nuenfeldt is a professor at the Escola Superior de Teologia at São Leopoldo in Brazil. At the CSW she participated in discussions about UN reform, where she has heard about how a gender perspective should be integrated across the UN system. According to Professor Nuenfeldt, the Latin American churches have begun to undertake similar processes, and held a consultation on gender inclusion last year. "Gender cannot be a department of our church," she said. "It must be in all the programs, and part of every budget discussion."

Though Nuenfeldt has enjoyed her time at the UN, she will be ready to return to Brazil and work with grassroots women again. "It is good to be here to learn about diplomacy, but it is so political and cold. Right now in Brazil I have friends that are protesting a logging company. Here I learn how to negotiate and be diplomatic, but we need this fight too - this hot feeling in our veins. I know the women, they have lost their land, they have no where to plant their food. I am asking, how can we be in solidarity with them?"

The three LWF delegates are not alone in representing the interest of churches. They join 45 women and five men from around the world as part of a coalition known as "Ecumenical Women", which meets for worship, training and collaboration. The coalition was formed in 2000 at the Five-Year Review of the Fourth World Conference on Women, know as Beijing +5.

The Ecumenical Women coalition includes the Anglican Consultative Council, The Lutheran World Federation, the Presbyterian Church (USA), United Methodist Office for the UN, the United Church of Christ, the World Council of Churches, the World Student Christian Federation, the World Federation of Methodist and Uniting Church Women and the Young Women's Christian Association.