Violence in Society is a subject of study as well as a matter of concern, more so in terms of Gender-Based Violence; not only for students of criminology and law but also of theology, human rights and civil society at large. The study of Christian Education is not only for acquiring the knowledge of the Bible and the Christian faith alone, but also for the holistic transformation of the society. The age-old practice of customary laws in which women are treated as inferior, in terms of depriving them from God-given opportunities, is the worst problem in every society. The goal of Christian Education is to address issues of historical injustices, traditional oppressive ideology; and it is responsible for proclaiming redeeming activity and concern for all humanity. Therefore, this book examines the age-old practice of Gender-Based Violence by identifying different forms of Gender-Based Violence both in Church and Society and has suggested relevant ways of responding to it through Christian Education.
Dr L. Asongla Pongen completed her primary and secondary education in her hometown, Mokokchung, Nagaland. Joined theological studies and completed B.Th (1985-1988) and BD (1989-91) from the Eastern Theological College, Jorhat, Assam; M.Th in Christian Ministry from the United Theological College, Bangalore (1996-1998). In 2004, she registered as a doctoral student at the South Asia Theological Research Institute (SATHRI), Bangalore. During her doctoral studies, she got the opportunity to have a four months academic exposure to the Queen's Foundations for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham, UK (Sept-Dec, 2007).
She has been teaching since 1998: Trinity Theological College, Dimapur, Nagaland (1998-2008); Clark Theological College, Aoljen, Mokokchung, Nagaland (2009-2019), where she also served as Head of- Department (HoD) for ten years (2010-2019). She was involved in Church Ministry as a resource person in the leadership trainings and seminars. She has also contributed a number of articles and authored a book entitled: Tamangdir Martoshi-A Biography of the First Convert from Longmisa Village (Ao Naga) in 2005.
This book is the result of my D.Th studies and personal experience as a woman. It was originally submitted as a doctoral thesis to the South Asia Theological Research Institute (SATHRI), Senate of Serampore College/University with the title Responding to the Challenges of Gender-based Violence through Christian Education in Nagaland. Other than few addition and subtraction, the original content of the thesis is presented as they are.
Gender-based violence is one of the most common and most widespread human rights abuses in the society. In many parts of the world, women are still isolated, unrecognized and constrained due to socio-cultural and legal structures that restrict their access to resources and control their movements and privileges. They find themselves under the bondage within the family, society and the church due to traditional and cultural restrictions. It is not surprising to find that even at times religions have reinforced oppression, segregation and discrimination of women. In spite of all the changes that are taking place today women and men seem to be living in different traditions.
The world Council of Churches has declared 1988-1998 as the 'Decade of women' and the United Nations also declared a 'Decade for a culture of peace and Non-violence for the children of the world' from 2001-2010, and a 'Decade to Overcome-violence,' yet, women and children's positions has not changed. During the decade many life challenging programmes were conducted with a numbers of writings, especially in support of women's condition in the society and in the church by feminist-inspired scholars, scientists, sociologists, psychologists, criminologists and theologians yet, the situation of women remain the same and becoming worse owing to the nature of facilities created by modern technology.
Despite the fact that people have moved away systematically from one age to another, from primitive to today's post modern age, and despite the progress in science and technology, economically and politically, we have no relevant means to curb away the social evil of gender-based violence. In other words, gender-based violence has not come to a stop; instead, it is intensely growing. Even though gender-based violence is a direct challenge to all, to the church in general and to the Christian educational ministry in particular, churches seem to have failed to address this issue. From the very beginning, its biblical teachings went along with all the prevalent cultural practices adopting the stereotyped roles in which men play superior and leading roles while women took the subordinate parts. Moreover, the interpretation of the Bible was also done in a biased way, teaching women subjectivity. Even the Biblical teachings were based on men superiority and women's inferiority, picking up a few Biblical references to support a negative expression on women. On the other hand, the church administration also adopted a system where men hold almost all the top positions or leading roles as decision- makers and so on. Besides, one of the great mistakes concerning the Christian educational ministry in the church is that it was understood as an activity mainly for children, and also the issue of gender-based violence was regarded as secular issue. With this perceptions, life threatening issue like gender-based was not given priority in the church educational ministry.
The goal Christian Education is to address issues of historical injustices, traditional oppressive ideology, and it is responsible for proclaiming redeeming activity and concern for all humanity. Therefore, how to overcome gender-based violence? How best to make aware of this problem in church and society? Can a new interpretation of the scriptures help? Can it be done through Christian education? These are some of the questions that this study attempts to answer. Exploring the norms, values and factors that influence gender-based violence and responding to these challenges through Church educational ministries, are the sole objectives of this book. Relevant and appropriate Christian education is required in order to build a life-sustaining community by challenging all forms of gender-based violence. The intention of this research is not to describe the violent situations alone but to critically analyze them, considering the socio-cultural, religious and customary law condition of the context.
**Contents and Sample Pages**
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