Appeal to Invite Women and Youth Leaders to Regional Body of Church Heads
Latin American and Caribbean Women Decry Increased Violence in Families
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador/GENEVA, 13 April 2003 (LWI) - Representatives of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) member churches in Latin America and the Caribbean have called on their regional body comprising heads of churches to invite leaders of women and youth work to their annual working conference in the future.
The call for the representation of women and youth in the Conference of Bishops and Presidents of Lutheran Churches in Latin America (COP) was part of the women’s message to the 51 participants in the April 6-9 Latin American and Caribbean LWF Pre-Assembly Consultation (PAC) in the Salvadoran capital, San Salvador. The region’s women met a day prior to the regional PAC, to discuss their contribution to the July 2003 Assembly in Winnipeg, Canada.
In their message, the women delegates recommend to the LWF that the “Women in Church and Society” in the LWF Department for Mission and Development should be renamed “Desk for Gender Issues in Church and Society.” The participants also called on the LWF to include trans-generational aspects and the subject of a “new masculinity” in future studies and projects.
In their message, the women participants listed six points summarizing the consequences of economic globalization for women in their region. They observed an increase in violence in families because of frustration, unemployment and growing individualization. They regretted the “feminization of poverty,” growing pressure to migrate, free trade agreements within Latin America, external influences on the traditional role models for women and the lack of church work on the problems in these areas.
Youth Disappointed about Limited Participation in LWF Tenth Assembly
In their message, the youth delegates from the region also dealt in detail with the effects of “economic globalization.” Because of lack of alternatives, many young people today felt compelled to migrate from the countryside to the towns or to other countries in the hope for better economic prospects, but their expectations were often unfulfilled. The youth frequently experienced discrimination and disillusionment, leading to a sense of hopelessness. Young people also suffered from outside determination and the apparently unbridled compulsion to consume.
The consequences, according to the youth message, were a growing number of eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia among young people, on the one hand, and hunger and malnutrition because of the shortage of food, on the other.
In this connection, the youth delegates called for the message of “life in its fullness” (vida abundante) to be proclaimed instead of the “gospel of affluence” (evangelio de la prosperidad) so as to place more emphasis on the issue of sustainability than on consumption.
The youth delegates also called on their churches to provide more opportunities for young people to undertake leadership tasks and to make room for creative participation. The communication between the church authorities and church youth organizations should also be improved, the youth message stated.
They expressed disappointment that three months before the start of the LWF Assembly it had not yet been possible to fill the quota for youth delegates from the member churches, despite repeated appeals from the LWF. Instead of the 20 percent required for youth participation, only 15 percent are guaranteed to date.
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