Education: the key to combating gender-based violence
Hong Kong Christian attitudes to people being abused in the home have to change if church is to be a refuge, writes Wong Wai Yin (translation by Josephine Chiu).
A woman who had suffered violence from her partner in Hong Kong told her pastor about it. He advised: "Sure, it is his fault to beat you. But, please stay and wait for one more year!"
Wong Wai Yin
We in the Hong Kong Women Christian Council (HKWCC) carried out research into the role and viewpoints of church pastoral care for domestic violence survivors between 2005 and 2006. We did so in collaboration with the Justice and Social Concern Committee of Hong Kong Christian Council and Mission to New Arrivals.
Churches have not yet figured out their position on domestic violence. This is particularly true of churches that emphasise the need to maintain a family's integrity - resist divorce - a teaching that leaves some women feeling judged or disappointed with the church. Sometimes they leave the congregation to go to another.
The way women, their pastors or churches look at suffering and endurance; gender roles; and the value of family integrity has a great impact on the length of the abused's tolerance of their situation.
We found it was dangerous if churches remained silent in response to the abused women's request for help; or used religious dogma to rationalise their violent situation - for example, encouraging the victim to take the attitude: "If he slaps my left face, I am willing to let him slap my right face" or limiting women's roles to being someone's wife and mother.
Figures from the Central Information System on Battered Spouse Cases and Sexual Violence Cases (CISBSSV) showed the number of battered spouse cases in Hong Kong surged from 1,009 in 1998 to 4,424 in 2006, quadrupling within eight years. Results of research by Hong Kong University from 2003 to 2005 showed that one in every 10 couples might face domestic violence.
The HKWCC research showed the number of Hong Kong churches dealing with domestic violence is quite high. Nearly two-thirds of the total number of interviewees confirmed or said they suspected they had dealt with domestic violence cases in the last three years.
Nearly a fifth of interviewees said they had either definitely or probably witnessed spouse battering in their own families. And nearly a third of laypersons said that they either saw or suspected some people within their inner circles were experiencing or had experienced battering by a spouse. It was mainly women who would seek help.
Power struggle
According to the annual record of the CISBSSV, around 85 per cent of victims in spousal battering are women.
Gender-based domestic violence happens because society and churches commonly acknowledge male headship in the family. And the major source of domestic violence is that the stronger family member exercises control over the weaker one - the woman.
Yet pastors and laypeople tended to hold back when asked whether spousal battering involves power struggle between sexes.
Over 30 per cent of surveyed pastors and laypeople didn't agree the major cause of spousal battering is that males want to exercise their power. Over 20 per cent of pastors and laypeople thought it was 50-50.
Quite a number of church members think that spousal battering may be the battered women's fault.
Over 30 per cent of pastors and laypeople didn't agree that the major cause for wives being beaten up by husbands is not that wives have done something wrong or have been disobedient.
In 2007 the HKWCC drafted Guidelines for Hong Kong Churches to Intervene in Domestic Violence, to help churches get clarity on identifying and intervening in situations, reporting it, confidentiality, legal procedure, morality, and the support of abusers and victims of abuse. It also continued programmes to raise awareness among local churches about gender-based domestic violence.
In the run up to the 25 November United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women we called churches and laypeople to sign our declaration against gender-based domestic violence and asked for the government to amend our domestic violence ordinance for better protection for victims.