When people ask, “Where are World Relief’s women’s empowerment programs?” our answer is, “Everywhere.”
Transforming how men and women live, relate to and honor God is at the very heart of our work. We know that women and girls do not exist in a vacuum – they live, work and school in communities – and it is only through the transformation of communities that gender reconciliation, empowerment and transformation can truly occur.
We have some women-centered programs – trauma care groups for victims of sexual and gender-based violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, maternal health programs for mothers, and teen clubs for pre-adolescent girls – but we embed gender equality thinking in almost all of our international development programs, starting from the level of belief.
Today, I would like to share with you two stories about a woman named Sarina – one fiction, one truth. Sarina’s story demonstrates the power of World Relief’s gender-inclusive approach and is proof that together we can #breakthebias and create communities where women and girls can thrive.
Sarina’s Story: A Common Occurrence
Sarina is a young wife and mother living in Malawi. She decides to join a savings group with high hopes that the program will change her life. At first, she is encouraged by the community of women and the potential opportunities. However, her husband, Chilaw, soon begins to resent the women’s program for its profitable nature.
When Sarina brings home her savings, Chiro spends and squanders her hard-earned money on himself, which results in Sarina being unable to invest in the things she wanted for her children, such as nutritious food, health insurance, and school fees. Her daughter Charity, in particular, is left malnourished and uneducated.
Chilo buys produce from a local farming group, but his parents prioritize food for their son over Charity. They sell the rest of their produce at the market and use the money they earn to send their son to school, while Charity stays home and does the housework. As a young woman, she has little sense of her own worth and longs for the day when she will be married off for a bride price and follow in her mother’s footsteps in life. Sarina’s family is caught in a vicious cycle of economic, social and relationship poverty.
Now, let’s rewrite this story and see what happens when World Relief’s gender-integrated approach is applied.
The true story of Sarina
In Sarina’s true story, she hears about a savings group. She wants to join but is worried about what her husband will think – he is, after all, the decision maker in the family. Still, World Relief hears her interest and encourages her to join.
At the same time, volunteers from a local church meet Salina and her husband, Chilo. They go through a transformational curriculum that will teach Chilo the inherent worth and dignity of a wife. Chilo learns that wives, too, were created in God’s image, are worthy of love and respect, and have God-given potential that must be nurtured, respected, and developed.
He encourages her to join a local savings group, and when she saves money, they sit down together to discuss how to spend it, along with the money Chilaw makes from selling his produce.
Sarina and Chiro also learn the value of their daughter Charity and decide it’s time to use the money they’ve saved to send her to school. Now that Charity is in school, World Relief encourages her to get involved with the local Youth and Girls Club. Chiro thinks it’s important for her daughter’s health and development and encourages her to get involved too. Charity learns about the power of education and the dangers of early marriage, and sets her sights on college.
Can you see the difference?
In both stories, savings, agriculture, nutrition, and youth clubs are implemented, but only in the second story do these programs have a restorative, transformative, and intergenerational impact on the life of Sarina and her family.
Real change happens at the level of beliefs and values within the home, primarily before any programmatic benefits are experienced. This is the power of our gender repair work.
We know that savings, agriculture, and countless other technical programs work best when they are built on the foundational work done within families, between spouses, between parents and children.
That’s why at World Relief, we work to empower women at the level of belief, starting with the family structure. Women and girls are empowered not because our programs focus solely on women and girls, but because we work to ensure that the entire community recognizes and respects the voices, roles and unique talents of these women and girls.
Our transformative curriculum drives this innovative approach to relief and development by focusing on the divine truth that men, women and children are all created in His image. We believe that the impact of our programs will be diminished unless relationships are transformed so that men and women, boys and girls, are equally valued, given equal opportunities and equally empowered.
Without this fundamental change, Sarina, her daughter, and the generations of women who follow them will remain trapped in cycles of marginalization and poverty. But with this change, change really is possible. A better future awaits Charity, her daughters and granddaughters. Their story has been rewritten.
Women’s agency, dignity, opportunity and empowerment come not only from technical programming, but from a deep understanding within communities and a drive to enable every member of the community – men, women, boys and girls – to realize their full God-given potential.
So where are our women empowerment programs?
It’s everywhere.
Francesca Albano currently serves as Director of Branded Content at World Relief. With a background in Cultural Anthropology and a graduate degree in Strategic Marketing Communications, she combines her interest in sociology and global cultures with her training in brand strategy and storytelling. Francesca is particularly passionate about grassroots community development and the treatment and advancement of women and girls around the world.
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