2022-08-12T22:26:53+00:00

Last updated on: August 12, 2022 at 10:26 pm   By

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Part#3 Special Report on the aftermath of acute gender imbalance: Discussing the horrendous reality of 100 million missing women worldwide.

A Little Girl’s Future Transformed

A beautiful story from Gospel for Asia’s archives tells about the day a cook at a Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported Bridge of Hope center noticed an elderly woman begging on the street. The cook was distressed because the older woman had a little girl, filthy and dressed in rags, in tow.

Knowing that adult beggars will often use children as bait to receive monies, then pocket the funds and do nothing for the child, the cook challenged the older woman, “Why are you exploiting this child?”

To the cook’s surprise, the older woman broke into tears and wept.

Daya, pictured at age 8 and age 15. Once among beggars in the street, she is now a thriving teen finding her place in this world and walking in her faith.
Daya, pictured at age 8 and age 15. Once among beggars in the street, she is now a thriving teen finding her place in this world and walking in her faith.

She wasn’t a professional beggar at all, but the grandmother of the little girl, Daya, who had been abandoned by both her mother and father. Without income and desperate, the grandmother had begun begging at bus stops, train stations and on the streets. With a change of heart, the cook invited the grandmother to enroll Daya in the Bridge of Hope center, which was in a building wedged between a railway station and a slum, conveniently available to children without a future.

The little girl was enrolled in the center but was so filthy that other parents complained. The Bridge of Hope staff conducted an intensive scrub session to relieve the child of dirt and germs and to replace the same filthy clothes she wore each day with clean clothes. They introduced her to soap and taught her to use it when she washed.

As the report states, “Daya’s future hung in the balance. If rejected from the Bridge of Hope center, she would return to the streets as one of the hundreds of thousands of child beggars in Asia. At some point, she would likely join the 20 to 30 million other boys and girls who are exploited as child laborers.”

The staff was determined to see that Daya thrived in Bridge of Hope, and she grew up to be an educated young woman. However, millions of other children never get that chance.

These are the hands of a child, covered in filth from doing construction work. Thousands of children, just like this one, can’t go to school because they are caught in bonded labor. Some 31 million girls of primary-school age are not in school. Seventeen million of these are expected to never enter school.
These are the hands of a child, covered in filth from doing construction work. Thousands of children, just like this one, can’t go to school because they are caught in bonded labor. Some 31 million girls of primary-school age are not in school. Seventeen million of these are expected to never enter school.

Child Exploitation

In a fact sheet on girls’ education, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) explains:

  • Some 31 million girls of primary-school age are not in school. Seventeen million of these are expected to never enter school.
  • Some 34 million female adolescents are missing from secondary schools, which often offer vocational skills that are essential for procuring future jobs.
  • Two-thirds of the 774 million illiterate people in the world are female.
    Thousands of these children can’t go to school because they are caught in bonded labor.

“It is doubtful they’ve ever held a toothbrush or a bar of soap; they’ve probably never eaten an ice-cream cone or cradled a doll,” Gospel for Asia (GFA) states. “The child laborers of Asia toil in fireworks, carpet and match factories; quarries and coal mines; rice fields, tea plantations and pastures; and even brothels. Because they are exposed to dust, toxic fumes, pesticides and disease, their health is compromised, and their bodies can be crippled from carrying heavy weights.”

Worse still, these children could be entrapped in prostitution.

These young women are prostitutes in the red-light district; some most likely entrapped since childhood.
These young women are prostitutes in the red-light district; some most likely entrapped since childhood.

According to Reuters, “Of an estimated 20 million commercial prostitutes in India, 16 million women and girls are victims of sex trafficking, according to [data gatherers].”

Prostitution is not illegal in India so the chances of victimization are mind-blowing. In addition, many impoverished families sell their daughters to opportunists who promise a better life for their children.

ABC News reports, “Aid organizations estimate that 20 to 65 million Indians have already passed through the hands of human traffickers at one point in their lives. Ninety percent of them remain within India’s national borders, and the majority are female and under the age of 18.”

One social worker, Palavi, explained, “Human trafficking works because the victims are afraid and cannot communicate. … Many of them have children who live in constant danger of also being sold or sexually abused. They grow up under the beds where their mothers were robbed of their dignity.”

When census data is gathered, these women, mothers and little girls are not in their villages, local communities or urban settlements. They are hidden by sex slave traders (but made available to the men who seek them out).

Let me ask again the question Jesus asked Simon the Pharisee, “Do you see this woman (or child, or little girl or teenager)?”

I have a granddaughter named Eliana who is 10 years old. Four mornings a week, I pick up Eliana and her brother, Nehemiah (8), to drive them to school. Their younger sister, Anelise (5), is picked up by the preschool bus. My driving effort is to help out their mother, who was married to our son Jeremy Mains. Our son, her husband and the children’s father, died five years ago at age 42 of blastic mantle cell lymphoma.

Angela, my daughter-in-law, is raising the children by herself while holding a full-time job as the director of a local community-outreach organization. She has just completed her dissertation and received a doctorate in adult education. Nevertheless, even with remarkable mothers, studies show that children raised without fathers are vulnerable. So my husband and I live close, are on call when babysitters fall through and try to do a lot of one-on-ones with our grandchildren.

Though I watch these grandchildren grow with an attentive heart, I am certain my granddaughter Eliana will never worry about entering bonded labor or be forced to go begging on the streets. It is impossible for me, even for the sake of achieving a frightening empathy, to impose through my imagination the horror of the lives of some 20 to 65 million trafficked females on these precious little girls I love.

These Bridge of Hope students look happy during class time at GFA’s Bridge of Hope program. Education can protect a girl from exploitation—and redirect her future. This is a primary solution to begin changing the statistics of 100 million missing women.
These Bridge of Hope students look happy during class time at GFA’s Bridge of Hope program. Education can protect a girl from exploitation—and redirect her future. This is a primary solution to begin changing the statistics of 100 million missing women.

Education as a Deterrent

Education can protect a girl from exploitation—and redirect her future. An educated girl can read. She can find work. She can get training to become a teacher, a doctor or a policewoman, for instance. She can tutor other children. A social system begins to change slowly, very slowly, one educated girl by one educated girl.

The latest statistics regarding GFA’s supported work with women in 2018 include:

290,753

women received free health care training

8,812

sewing machines distributed as a means to obtain work as a seamstress

61,880

illiterate women learned to read and write

11,000+

women desperate for jobs received vocational training

Educating girls is a primary solution to begin changing the statistics of 100 million missing women. The Global Partnership for Education maintains, “The power of girls’ education on national economic growth is undeniable: a one percentage point increase in female education raises the average gross domestic product (GDP) by 0.3 percentage points and raises annual GDP growth rates by 0.2 percentage points.”

The World Bank stresses that girls’ education goes beyond getting into school. It is also about ensuring they learn and feel safe in school. One research study in Haiti indicated, “One in three Haitian women (ages 15 to 49) has experienced physical and/or sexual violence, and that of women who received money for sex before turning 18 years old, 27 percent reported schools to be the most common location for solicitation.”

Through Bridge of Hope, Gospel for Asia (GFA) offers child sponsorships for the neediest impoverished children whose families are caught in the cycle of poverty and are unable to provide education for their offspring. The sponsorship amount is $35 per month per child. This educational ministry sees that some 70,000 children (both boys and girls) are given a daily meal, regular medical checkups and training in basic hygiene.

What can we—those of us who have hearts that beat with concern about the unbelievable evils of this world—do about the women worldwide who face discrimination and violence? How can anyone make a dent in a problem with such magnified proportionality? How can that horrific statistic—100 million missing women—be conquered, overcome, defeated, reduced or even eliminated?

What Can We Do? How Can We Conquer the Horrific 100 Million Missing Women Statistic?

What can we—those of us who have hearts that beat with concern about the unbelievable evils of this world—do about the 100 million missing women worldwide who face discrimination and violence? How can anyone make a dent in a problem with such magnified proportionality? How can that horrific statistic—100 million missing women—be conquered, overcome, defeated, reduced or even eliminated?

Well, there are some things we can do, small as they seem, but mighty nevertheless in their possibility:

We can sponsor girls (and boys) so they get educated through programs like GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program. And if $35 a month is too much for you (and it is for some compassionate people), invite your small group, Sunday School class, men’s softball league, neighborhood coffee-klatch or members of your extended family to pool funds.

Think about this question: Why do more people not see this inequality and neglect, not grieve for the 100 million missing women and girls who have experienced such hardships and take action to be part of the solution? Then read the book of Luke and think about the societal shift that begins with women’s encounters with Jesus.

Remind yourself of Christ’s question: “Do you see this woman?” Write it out on a card, and then use it as a bookmark in the books you read or paste it on your bathroom mirror. Write out a prayer, like the one I included in the beginning of this article, but adapt it to this horrific dilemma: Lord, what do You want me to do about the masses of women? And if you are not a praying person, send some discontented energy into the atmosphere any way you feel fit. Just don’t forget.

Let us conclude by going back to Jesus, except now He is not eating at the table of the VIPs. He is bloody, tortured, hanging from a cross and nearing death. The Gospel of John describes the inhumanity of the Roman soldiers and the crowds standing beneath the cross.

“Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!’ Then He said to the disciple, ‘Behold your mother!’ And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home.”

Concern for the widow. Concern for the women.

“Look at this woman. Do you now see your mother?”

So, let us also be about this work in the world.

Oh, Lord, help us to care for every human with hearts that beat like Your heart beats for them. And help us, please help us, no matter our gender, to see the women.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report on 100 Million Missing Women & the Aftermath of Acute Gender Imbalance here: Part 1 | Part 2

Learn more about Gospel for Asia’s programs to combat the 100 million missing women reality by helping women through Vocational Training, Sewing Machines and Literacy Training.

This Special Report article originally appeared on GFA.org

Read more on the 100 million missing women dilemma on gender imbalance and violence against women on Patheos.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: Facebook | Sourcewatch | Integrity | Flickr | GFA | Lawsuit

2022-10-29T05:28:41+00:00

Last updated on: October 29, 2022 at 5:28 am   By

The first time Tanul tried alcohol, it must have burned his throat and boiled in his belly. Unpleasant as it was, it would not be the last time he put his lips around the bottle. In fact—like the poverty he was born into—it became his constant companion. By the time Tanul was a teenager, he drank regularly. Like most young men in his rural village, Tanul filled his body with alcohol to erase the shame of poverty from his heart and mind. This destructive habit would follow Tanul as he began to build a life for himself.

When Tanul married, he did not lay aside his drinking. As the burden of caring for a family increased, so did his time with the bottle. Children came, and Tanul was unable to provide adequate food for his family or cover school fees—making a hopeful future for them impossible. Tanul was stuck in a vicious cycle, and the more he drank, the less hire-able he became.

The first time Tanul tried alcohol, it must have burned his throat and boiled in his belly. Unpleasant as it was, it would not be the last time he put his lips around the bottle. In fact—like the poverty he was born into—it became his constant companion.
In many rural villages plagued by poverty, men gather to gamble and drink in the absence of work.

Tanul’s journey is not an isolated incident. It’s a problem all over the world; alcoholism and poverty go hand-in-hand. Though it is not proven that one always leads to the other, there is an ugly, symbiotic relationship. As alcohol consumption increases, employability decreases. While employment dries up, many use drinking to ease the shame, which exacerbates the cycle. Often, the only work left for alcoholics in Asia is manual labor for which they are hired on a day-by-day basis. Because of the difficulty—and sometimes the impossibility—for the poor to rise above these employment options, many turns to alcohol to ease poverty’s sting. The stress of not knowing if you will find work each day inflates the problem.

Abuse Multiplied: Poverty, Alcohol, and…

As Tanul’s family fell apart, another near relation to the twin problems of alcoholism and poverty arrived: domestic violence. Coming home intoxicated and angry, Tanul began abusing his wife and children daily. The little money he earned went to supporting his addiction. This family, plagued by poverty, alcoholism and domestic violence, was living out the well-worn path blazed by many of the world’s extreme poor.

In the village pictured, 80 percent of the rice crop is used to brew homemade alcohol— resulting in a high consumption of alcohol. This leads to frequent occurrences of domestic violence.
In the village pictured, 80 percent of the rice crop is used to brew homemade alcohol— resulting in a high consumption of alcohol. This leads to frequent occurrences of domestic violence.

Step One on the Road Out of Poverty

Pastor Teja, who has a church in a nearby village, met Tanul’s family one day when he was offering prayer for families in need. The Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported pastor saw the pitiful condition of this family, and his heart was heavy. The family invited him back to pray for them, and a friendship began. Tanul’s family began to attend Pastor Teja’s church. Then members of the church continually prayed for Tanul’s deliverance from alcohol—the thing that bound them to the poverty they lived in. Through their faithful prayers and Pastor Teja’s counseling, Tanul overcame his addiction to alcohol. The Lord completely transformed Tanul’s heart!

For the first time, Tanul’s family experienced freedom—freedom as a gift from God above that trickled down into their hearts and flowed toward each other in love. This freedom from bondage gave them hope for the future. But in the present, they are still stuck in the poverty trap.

This predicament of the extreme poor—not being able to find work that will support a family’s daily needs—is one of the basic issues addressed by world leaders and organizations dedicated to alleviating poverty around the globe. One expert working with the Borgen Project, a non-profit dedicated to fighting global poverty, is convinced the first step[1] in reducing extreme cyclic poverty is helping the poor create their own businesses. This is the very thing many Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported pastors and missionaries can do with income-producing gifts provided by donors all over the world.

Pastor Teja knew that Tanul needed a way to earn enough income to support his family. He arranged to hold a gift distribution and presented Tanul with a rickshaw—something he never could have afforded on his own. Tanul was overcome with gratitude at God’s provision.

Tanul's whole family has been transformed since the Lord entered their lives.
Tanul’s whole family has been transformed since the Lord entered their lives.

A New Reputation

With his new gift, Tanul loaded vegetables onto his rickshaw and began selling throughout the village—even delivering produce to customers’ homes. God blessed Tanul’s diligence and hard work, enabling him to earn a good income selling vegetables. Setting his own prices and being able to keep all his earnings, Tanul had enough money to send Maahir to school to learn a skilled trade. Maahir completed his education and started working as a carpenter. The two men now adequately support their growing family, including Maahir’s wife and two children.

Self-employment frees those trapped in the cycle of poverty from discrimination, unfair business practices and job insecurity — circumstances to which the poor and uneducated are vulnerable. Gifts like rickshaws, sewing machines and water buffalo are the means to break free from the bondage of poverty and to set thousands of families on a new course of self-sufficiency and hope for future generations.

Income producing gifts, like these goats, help lift impoverished families in Asia out of the trap of poverty.
Income producing gifts, like these goats, help lift impoverished families in Asia out of the trap of poverty.

Join the Global Effort to End Extreme Poverty

The fight against extreme poverty is not finished—736 million people in 2015 were still living on less than $1.90 a day.[2] Almost half of these people reside[3] in the countries where Gospel for Asia (GFA) supports national workers. Gospel for Asia (GFA) believes that together, we can make a lasting difference in the lives of those caught in the extreme poverty trap.

Join GFA in providing pastors, missionaries and other national workers with tools to lift those in their communities out of the harsh poverty trap.

[1] The Borgen Project, Top 10 Facts about Poverty in India

[2] The World Bank, Decline of Global Extreme Poverty Continues but Has Slowed: World Bank

[3] Our World in Data, Tree Map of Extreme Poverty Distribution

Source: Gospel for Asia Features, Rickshaw Unlocks a New Path

Learn more on Gospel for Asia’s Special Reports on:

Learn more about how generosity can change lives. Gifts like pigs, bicycles and sewing machines break the cycle of poverty and show Christ’s love to impoverished families in Asia. One gift can have a far-reaching impact, touching families and rippling out to transform entire communities.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

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2022-10-29T05:35:58+00:00

Last updated on: October 29, 2022 at 5:35 am   By

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Part#2 Special Report on the aftermath of acute gender imbalance: Discussing the horrendous reality of 100 million missing women worldwide.

Gospel for Asia (GFA) Part#2 Special Report on the aftermath of acute gender imbalance: Discussing the horrendous reality of 100 million missing women worldwide.
Geeta’s husband used to come home drunk and beat her with the wooden cricket bat pictured. Violence against women is a major public health problem in Asia and a violation of women’s human rights. The majority of this violence is intimate-partner violence, estimated to be 30 percent worldwide.

Intimate-Partner Violence Against Women Contributes to Gender Imbalance

One of the greatest contributors to this missing-women / gender imbalance factor is violence against women—both sexual violence and violence by their own intimate partners. According to the World Health Organization, “Violence against women—particularly intimate partner violence and sexual violence—is a major public health problem and a violation of women’s human rights.”

  • Global estimates indicate that about 1 in 3 women worldwide (35 percent) have been victims of physical and/or sexual violence, sometimes inflicted by their own intimate partners, in their lifetimes.
  • “As many as 38 percent of murders of women are committed by a male intimate partner.”
  • “Violence can negatively affect women’s physical, mental, sexual and reproductive health, and may increase the risk of acquiring HIV in some settings.”
  • “Men are more likely to perpetrate violence if they have low education, a history of child mistreatment, exposure to domestic violence against their mothers, harmful use of alcohol, gender imbalance norms including attitudes accepting of violence, and a sense of entitlement over women.”

A conclusion about the above data is, obviously, that intimate-partner violence is an undeniable contributor to the missing-women dilemma. In case there is any doubt as to what exactly is meant by all this, the United Nations defines violence against women as “any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.”

The Coequal Value Seen in Genesis

The extraordinary message of the Christian Scriptures, beginning with the first book of the Old Testament, Genesis, affirms the value of men and women: “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

Biblically faithful Christianity has always been confronted by this theological premise: Man and woman are created in the image of God. It’s a huge bump in the road for those who might mistreat the female sector within its following and is a premise worthy of the moans and groans of those who hear a sermon pointing out their misconduct. How we treat one another, in Christendom, is evidence of the reality and depth of our faith.

This young woman, Maloti, was kidnapped from the tea farm she worked on as a day laborer and recently married to someone of a higher caste. Her in-laws, disgusted by her being of a lower caste, hated her so much that they poisoned her. Their murderous attempt failed and Maloti survived, but suffered damage to her vocal cords.
This young woman, Maloti, was kidnapped from the tea farm she worked on as a day laborer and recently married to someone of a higher caste. Her in-laws, disgusted by her being of a lower caste, hated her so much that they poisoned her. Their murderous attempt failed and Maloti survived, but suffered damage to her vocal cords.

Do You See This Woman?

Let’s summarize again that story from Luke that began this article, “And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner … brought an alabaster flask of fragrant oil, and stood at His feet behind him weeping; and she began to wash His feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head; and she kissed His feet and anointed them with the fragrant oil.”

The important religious leader, a Pharisee named Simon, was appalled by this woman who, uninvited, crashed his dinner party. In his heart he thought Jesus could not possibly be who He said He was, or He would know what kind of woman she was. Simon certainly thought he knew what kind of woman she was—an emotional type, obviously; a town prostitute, probably. A woman of bad manners and of lower class, which was not his type of person, certainly.

Jesus tells a parable about two debtors, one who owed a creditor little and one who owed the same man much. Both of their debts were forgiven. Jesus asks his host, Simon, which one he thinks loved the creditor the most—the one with little debt forgiven or the one with much debt forgiven? The answer is obvious, even to those of us reading the story many years removed from the dinner-party incident. We agree with the Pharisee’s answer: the one who was forgiven much.

At the risk of being redundant, it is here that Christ asks the question that resounds through the centuries, one that should be considered by any hostile intimate partner and any theologian or churchgoer who has a twisted, misogynies theology: “Simon, do you see this woman?”

This photo tells a story from the book of Luke: An uninvited woman, seen as a sinner, a woman of lower class who wanted to wash a religious leader’s feet with her own tears. The owner of the house was appalled by her, but Jesus “saw this woman”, intervened and provided protection, illustrating how to advocate for those longing for forgiveness.
This photo tells a story from the book of Luke: An uninvited woman, seen as a sinner, a woman of lower class who wanted to wash a religious leader’s feet with her own tears. The owner of the house was appalled by her, but Jesus “saw this woman”, intervened and provided protection, illustrating how to advocate for those longing for forgiveness.

Do you see this woman? Christ saw the woman, not her bad reputation, not her past misdeeds, not her wayward lifestyle. He saw her best potential self. He saw her broken heart. He saw the gratefulness she felt that any man could think she was something other than the role the community had assigned to her.

Jesus saw the women. If you want to conduct a study as to Jesus’ attitude toward women in a time when they were considered lower than second class, look through the stories collected in the Gospel of Luke. Here we see a man who loved women, advocated for them, healed them and welcomed them as companions in His earthly ministry.

We, too, need to see the women of the world. We need to turn our energies toward helping countries change and cure the great harms that have contributed to the extraordinary demographic imbalance of some 110 males for every 100 women. Indeed, many developing countries consider elevating women from underclass to an educated class as a means of increasing the capacity of the country to function competitively in a global economy.

This little girl, along with thousands of other children, lives in the slums of Delhi. She—and the children like her—lack access to education, nutritious food and health care facilities, to name the least. They begin working at a very young age picking up trash or working for small workshops to earn wages to provide for themselves.
This little girl, along with thousands of other children, lives in the slums of Delhi. She—and the children like her—lack access to education, nutritious food and health care facilities, to name the least. They begin working at a very young age picking up trash or working for small workshops to earn wages to provide for themselves. Realities like this lead to an increasing amount of missing women and acute gender imbalance worldwide.

A Consensual Solidarity of Concern

Let us grieve for these who have suffered such hardships, deprivation, bondage, violence, societal disfavor or low self-esteem brought on by the scornful esteem of the men in one’s social circle. Let us form a solidarity of concern and do what we can to change the capacity of others, either men or women, but for the purposes of this article, particularly women, for the 100 million missing women and fight the aftermath of gender imbalance.

In 1980, I went on a sponsored survey trip for Food for the Hungry to write about that organization’s work in the disaster areas of the world. It was an extraordinary global journey and an extraordinary exposure to the needs and crises of humanity worldwide as well. At the start of the trip, on April 1 in Hong Kong, I had time to do a study of Christ’s ministry as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, and I wrote out all the verses to remind myself of how dramatic His healing, teaching and miracle-filled ministry must have been to the masses.

Something about Christ’s response to the needy women who were part of all those crowds touched me deeply, and I wrote:

Lord, I praise You that while You are also God of the individual, You are also God of the masses. What did you have in mind for me to write about these masses of women?

  • Those who with little household aids, nevertheless, keep their houses (huts or tents) clean?
  • Those who demonstrate industry weaving or knitting?
  • Those who work in gardens, hoeing with homemade instruments or digging in the soil with sharpened sticks?
  • Those who run sidewalk cafés—little set-up carts?
  • Those who pour cool drips of the water have walked miles to gather over the bodies of their sweaty and dirty children?
  • Those who are painstakingly learning English in order to better themselves with foreigners?
  • Those who are raising pigs in piggeries?
  • Those in refugee camps who have nothing profitable to do afternoon after afternoon after afternoon?
  • Those who have willingly offered me their babies because the past is horrendous, their husbands are no longer alive and the future looks hopeless?
  • Those with wholesome, plain faces who volunteer their lives to serve the missionaries who bring some sensibility of promise into nonsensical and unpromising conditions?
  • Those who plant flowers in front of their settlement housing (canvas tents or ramshackle shelters)?

There is something about actually seeing the masses of needy and desperate yet often-courageous women struggling just to survive in the resettlement housing in Hong Kong, in the refugee camps in Thailand (those fleeing the Pol Pot massacres in Cambodia), in the canvas villages with dirt paths, in the milk-and-food lines provided by development organizations, or in the old abandoned ammo depots now housing a population of 20,000.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report on 100 Million Missing Women & the Aftermath of Acute Gender Imbalance here: Part 1 | Part 3

Learn more about Gospel for Asia’s programs to combat the acute gender imbalance reality by helping women through Vocational Training, Sewing Machines and Literacy Training.

This Special Report article originally appeared on GFA.org

Read more on the missing women dilemma on gender imbalance and violence against women on Patheos.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: Facebook | Sourcewatch | Integrity | Flickr | GFA | Lawsuit

2022-06-16T05:38:07+00:00

Last updated on: June 16, 2022 at 5:38 am   By

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Part#1 Special Report on the aftermath of acute gender imbalance: Discussing the horrendous reality of 100 million missing women worldwide.

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Special Report on the aftermath of acute gender imbalance: Discussing the horrendous reality of 100 million missing women worldwide.

One of the stunning stories from Scripture tells about the uninvited woman who crashed a VIP party at the home of an important religious leader. This is a gal whose bad reputation preceded her—a “woman of the city” reports the account in the book of Luke. Some versions even say that she “was a great sinner.”

Humph, thinks the very important dignitary whose party has been so rudely disrupted by this emotional female basket case. If he [Jesus] was a true prophet, he would know what kind of woman this is, for she is a great sinner.

This is a powerful story of male intervention, protection and advocacy, and in this case, it is Jesus who intervenes for a weeping woman, provides protection and clearly illustrates how to advocate for those wounded and longing for forgiveness.

“Simon,” Jesus asks, “Do you see this woman?”

Do you see this woman? What a question!

Do you see this woman? This is a question that needs to be asked regarding the astonishing demographic figure that is being forced upon our contemporary discussions regarding the status of women in the world today. Indeed, demographers are telling us that there are as many as 100 million women unaccounted for, 100 million missing women in the projections made by statisticians whose job it is to analyze and project the populations of the nations.

Simply stated, the devaluation of women and the often societally approved discrimination against them are creating a global crisis. This article examines this reality and seeks to propose that there are attitudes and actions we can all take to decrease and eventually eliminate this outrageous discrepancy. But first, we have to “see the women.”

These village women are widows, and often endure threats and distress simply because of their social status as a “widow”. What Happened to the Missing Women?
These village women are widows, and often endure threats and distress simply because of their social status as a “widow”.

What Happened to the Missing Women?

My husband, David Mains, tells the story of being in Asia with Dr. KP Yohannan, the founder and director of Gospel for Asia (GFA). They were attending a conference with some 300 men in attendance in an open-air pavilion. Dr. K.P. was preaching on how these men treated their wives, saying something that memory recalls as being to the effect of, “You treat them like servants [by saying], ‘Do this; do that. Take care of me.’ You get angry and yell. Some of you even push them around. But you are not freeing them to be the women God created them to be.”

The power of this exhortation and of the Scriptures verifying his instruction manifested itself in a loud groaning that began to rise out of the group of men sitting on wooden pews.

“At first,” David remembers, “I thought it was a thunderstorm. I had never heard anything like it in my life. Then I realized these men were groaning in repentance and remorse.”

Here you see a family that has been transformed through the love of God. This man used to beat his wife and child, but after listening to KP Yohannan’s words through a GFA-supported radio broadcast, they found God’s love and are living happily in their journey with Christ.
Here you see a family that has been transformed through the love of God. This man used to beat his wife and child, but after listening to KP Yohannan’s words through a Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported radio broadcast, they found God’s love and are living happily in their journey with Christ.

The devaluation of women in marriage, which those men repented of many years ago, is merely one symptom of what causes the 100-million-missing-women global crisis. If we choose to “see the women,” to study the plight of women worldwide and to pay attention to their distress, we will quickly conclude that women’s lives are threatened from the womb through widowhood.

Indeed, the whole world needs to be groaning in remorse and repentance when we realize that 100 million women who should be alive according to statisticians’ projections are nowhere to be found.

The reasons for this are varied and tragic. Even the numbers vary somewhat. In a 1990 essay published in The New York Review of Books, Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen claimed there were 100 million missing women. Through the following decade, Sen continued to expand his exploration and discoveries, which were published in many subsequent academic works.

Though estimates of between 90 and 101 million missing women, as well as the various causes for the phenomenon, have been studied, debated and analyzed by demographers and social scientists in the years since Sen’s original announcement, most agree now to the reality that roughly 100 million women, worldwide, are missing.

This number is determined by what is called the sex ratio—a means of measuring the number of males born in a society against the number of women. Generally, the male-female birth ratio is slightly biased toward the masculine sex. Due to some kind of disequilibrium matrix, nature allows for some 105 male births for every 100 female births, on average.

These numbers tell us, quietly, a terrible story of inequality and neglect leading to the excessive mortality of women.

Demographers propose that this is because men are at a higher risk of dying of a variety of causes—violence, accidents, injuries, war casualties—and in time, the sex ratio of a given population for any particular age set begins to equalize. Today, however, when what should be a normal equalized sex ratio is measured in many current populations, particularly in developing countries in Asia, as well as in the Middle East and in parts of Africa, results show a divergence from the norm.

The current sex ratio reveals not a ratio that is beginning to become even between the sexes, but an expanding ratio of men to women of 1.06 (1.06 men per 1 woman), which is far higher than in most countries.

Researcher Amartya Sen concludes: “These numbers tell us, quietly, a terrible story of inequality and neglect leading to the excessive mortality of women.”

Evaluating the Sex-Ratio Disequilibrium

It is here when those of us who care about the state of the world and the suffering and the well-being of the people who inhabit it should begin to groan, loudly and insistently, like a thunderstorm. We need to read the articles that disclose the state of women around the world; we need to do personal research. We need to seek for understanding.

34 million

women and girls are trapped in the sex trade, contributing to the missing women dilemma.

There is now a general consensus as to the reasons why sex ratios are teetering on a wild gender imbalance in various countries of the world. Sex-selective abortions, female infanticide, inadequate health care and nutrition for female offspring, lack of pregnancy and childbirth education, and the now booming sex-slave trade industry all contribute to the missing women dilemma.

In their comprehensive book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn report, “Far more women and girls are shipped into brothels each year in the early twenty-first century than African slaves were shipped into slave plantations each year in the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries.”

This horrendous reality is verified by the Foreign Affairs journal, and the above husband-and-wife writing team estimate some 34 million women and girls worldwide are trapped in the sex-slave trade.

This newborn infant from South Sudan lies in an incubator, suffering from sepsis and jaundice and struggling to survive. His mother died giving birth.
This newborn infant from South Sudan lies in an incubator, suffering from sepsis and jaundice and struggling to survive. His mother died giving birth. Photo by Mark Naftalin, UNICEF

Maternal Mortality and Maternal Morbidity

The issue of malnourishment also takes a generational toll. When girls are malnourished—and historically, girls often live on subsistence diets while their brothers receive the family’s available food—they give birth to underweight babies whose bodies are then more susceptible to disease. Malnourished girls become malnourished women, prone to childbirth losses—miscarriages, stillbirths, infant deaths—and multiple pregnancy complications resulting in mortality.

This young girl from the Democratic Republic of Congo brought her younger sister to a health center to have a malnutrition screening, after being driven from their home and community during a violent conflict between the government and anti-government militia.
This young girl from the Democratic Republic of Congo brought her younger sister to a health center to have a malnutrition screening, after being driven from their home and community during a violent conflict between the government and anti-government militia. Photo by Vincent Tremeau, UNICEF

In India, for instance, demographers find that, by and large, the main cause of female deaths is cardiovascular disease—diseases of the heart and blood vessels that can lead to heart attacks or strokes. Medical researchers have discovered a close relationship between low birth weight and eventual cardiovascular diseases at a later age.

Maternal mortality refers to the number of women who die in childbirth. Some 99 percent of women in the world who die giving birth are from poor countries. This is determined by another ratio—the maternal mortality ratio (MMR), the number of maternal deaths for every 100,000 live births. The MMR measures the potential of death per pregnancy. Another ratio measures death probability over a lifetime of multiple pregnancies. The lifetime risk of dying in childbirth is 1,000 times higher in a poor country.

“This should be an international scandal,” Kristof and WuDunn write.

To sketch out this global crisis, Kristof and WuDunn quote some alarming statistics:

  • The highest maternal mortality risk in the world is in the African country of Niger.
    There the lifetime risk of death is 1 in 7.
  • In sub-Saharan Africa, the lifetime risk of death in childbirth is 1 in 22.
  • India is 1 in 70.
  • The United States is 1 in 4,800, a high ratio for a developed and wealthy country.
  • In Italy, the lifetime risk is 1 in 26,000.
  • In Ireland, the chance of dying in childbirth is 1 in 46,000.

Morbidity is different from mortality. Maternal morbidity deals with injuries during childbirth, and they occur even more frequently than maternal mortality. Again, Half the Sky concentrates pages on occurrence of morbidity, particularly fistulas—in this case, rectovaginal fistulas, which are often the result of trauma in childbirth. Here a tear between the vagina and rectum (also caused by rape) is left untreated in places where there is inadequate health care. These women, many now mothers, having successfully delivered an infant, become outcasts in their villages because they cannot control the flow of urine or feces.

“For every woman who dies in childbirth, at least ten suffer significant injuries such as fistulas or serious tearing,” Kristof and WuDunn write. “Unsafe abortions cause the deaths of seventy thousand women annually and cause serious injuries to another 5 million. The economic cost of caring for those 5 million women is estimated to be $750 million annually. And there is evidence that when a woman dies in childbirth, her surviving children are much more likely to die young as well, because they will have no mother caring for them.”

The lifetime risk of dying in childbirth is 1,000 times higher in a poor country.

All these factors are symptoms of one major toxic cause: female discrimination. Simply stated: Women in a cross section of wide-ranging cultures are not valued. In fact, they are actively abused, neglected and abandoned through countless ingrained cultural practices that deem women as inferior to men and ensure they stay in subsistence-like conditions.

The conglomerate of all these causes contributes to the overall demographic reality of 100 million missing women. To repeat Amartya Sen again: “These numbers tell us, quietly, a terrible story of inequality and neglect leading to the excessive mortality of women.”

The Irony of the Skewed Sex Ratio

The irony of the missing-women demographics—enabled by entrenched cultural attitudes and systemic discrimination against the female sex—is that many places in the world with a skewed sex ratio are now experiencing such high female shortages that there are no longer enough women to mate in marriage with the existing male population. Think about that 1.06:1 sex ratio (again, 1.06 men to every 1 woman), and multiply it by the thousands. Imagine what that means. Imagine the implications.

This photo is just one depiction of a once-looming human rights catastrophe. Because of the skewed sex ratio in Asia, many countries are now experiencing such high female shortages that there are no longer enough women to mate in marriage with the existing male population. In 1990, a cultural preference for male children had caused South Korea's sex ratio to be at the world's highest, but after campaigns and restrictions on ultrasounds, the ratio is back to normal.
This photo is just one depiction of a once-looming human rights catastrophe. Because of the skewed sex ratio in Asia, many countries are now experiencing such high female shortages that there are no longer enough women to mate in marriage with the existing male population. In 1990, a cultural preference for male children had caused South Korea’s sex ratio to be at the world’s highest, but after campaigns and restrictions on ultrasounds, the ratio is back to normal.

The Wall Street Journal focused an article on this topic that dealt with South Korea:

“A cultural preference for male children has cost Asia dearly. … Not just a human-rights catastrophe, it is also a looming demographic disaster. With Asian birthrates already plummeting, that means millions of women will never be mothers, and the economic and social impact on some of the world’s largest countries is incalculable.

“For decades, South Korea was Exhibit A in this depressing trend. By 1990, as medical advances made prenatal sex selection routine, the ratio of male-to-female babies soared in South Korea to the world’s highest, at 116.5 males for every 100 females.”

Projections made by the Population Council, a New York City-based research center, indicate that if trends continue, there will be an increase to 150 million missing women by 2035. The world is just sensing the demographic wave that was set into motion years ago. This means that in China, by 2035 there will be as many as 186 single men for every 100 women. In India, by 2060 the sex ratio could curve even higher: 191 men for every 100 women.

A cultural preference for male children [is] not just human-rights catastrophe, it is also a looming demographic disaster.

The governments of both countries have established means and laws to correct this extraordinary deviation. Fetal ultrasound imaging has been restricted (at the least, the reporting of the sex of the child while in utero), and legislation aimed at gender equality, to address gender imbalance has been enacted. China even offers financial incentives to couples with daughters and announced it was abandoning its one-child policy. But demographers warn that even if both countries brought their sex ratios to normal, the damage has been done. Hundreds of millions of Asian men in their 50s will still be unmarried in 2070. In India, the result would be around 15 percent.

Can this rampant and damaging sexism be altered? Remember South Korea, once Exhibit A? Now, partly because of the political insistence of a growing body of educated women, it is beginning to reduce its sex ratio through a variety of national policies. By 2005, the ratio had become 110 males for every 100 female babies. Five years later, the ratio became 107, finally normalizing at the natural level of 105.

Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report on 100 Million Missing Women & the Aftermath of Acute Gender Imbalance here: Part 2 | Part 3

Learn more about Gospel for Asia’s programs to combat the Missing Women reality by helping women through Vocational Training, Sewing Machines and Literacy Training.

This Special Report article originally appeared on GFA.org

Read more on the missing women dilemma on gender imbalance and violence against women on Patheos.

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2022-11-05T16:31:10+00:00

Last updated on: November 5, 2022 at 4:31 pm   By

Reflections on the 40-year Ministry of Gospel for Asia

Make no mistake, this is not a story about Dr. K.P. Yohannan. This is a story of what the Lord has done with and for and through and in him. The greatest ability we can give to the Lord is “availability.” All that young man had to offer the Lord in 1979 was a willing and obedient heart.

The world has yet to see what God can do with and for and through and in and by the man who is fully and wholly consecrated to Him. I want to be that man.D.L. Moody

No doubt that statement by the great American evangelist D.L. Moody is still true, although the Lord used him mightily.

We have surely seen “what God can do with and for and through and in” by the likes of Billy Graham, Luis Palau, Tim LaHaye, Jerry Falwell, Chuck Smith, Greg Laurie and many others. But we still don’t know if we have seen the fulfillment of the desire of Moody’s heart that each of these men shared.

The amazing thing about the people God uses most effectively is that they seek no glory for themselves, they spend hours in prayer, and they yield all that they are and all they possess to serve the Lord in whatever way He directs their paths.

Rarely, when these men were young, did they anticipate a day 40 or more years into the future when they would look back in amazement at what the Lord had empowered and enabled them to do.

They did not set out to make a name for themselves or to establish an empire. They simply made themselves available as vessels separated and set aside for the Lord’s use. They, and others like them, can look back and stand in awe of how an Almighty God has blessed their ministries abundantly and beyond imagination.

I know a man exactly like that. His name is Dr. K.P. Yohannan. He is one of the humblest and most dedicated men I have ever known. Forty years ago, he responded to God’s call to minister to the millions of people in Asia. Little did he know that in 2019 he would be able to look back at the remarkable things the Lord did over the past 40 years.

How will the Lord do with these men?

Make no mistake, this is not a story about Dr. K.P. Yohannan. This is a story of what the Lord has done with and for and through and in him. The greatest ability we can give to the Lord is “availability.” All that young man had to offer the Lord in 1979 was a willing and obedient heart.

The Lord used that available vessel to begin Gospel for Asia (GFA) and to lead the ministry with a singular focus: to take the love of Christ to people who have never heard His name before.

In a newly released video, Dr. Yohannan invites us to join Gospel for Asia (GFA) in celebrating “the 40 years of this incredible journey with our Lord.” In the video, he reminisces with effervescence because of the numerous healthy congregations the Lord has established through GFA-supported workers serving in more than 16 countries.

He shares an overview of the numbers of children that have been able rescued from lives of abandonment on the streets and in the slums, many of whom have had to beg on the streets or dig through garbage dumps simply to live another day of desperation.

“The amazing thing about the people God uses most effectively is that they seek no glory for themselves, they spend hours in prayer, and they yield all that they are and all they possess to serve the Lord in whatever way He directs their paths.”
Gospel for Asia helps provide education, meals, school supplies and health care for more than 70,000 of these children through its Bridge of Hope program—all because of a willing heart and the prayers and financial gifts of godly men and women and churches around the world.

Dr. K.P.’s vision is for the Lord to open the doors to be able to minister to half-a-million children who are trapped in the same circumstances in the developing countries of Asia.

He speaks in the video about the multitudes of women who have been rescued from poverty, prostitution and physical abuse. GFA-supported workers share the love of Christ with them and help them to find a way out of their plight, offering them literacy education and vocational training.

Who would have dreamed 40 years ago that the Lord would use the generosity of Gospel for Asia (GFA) supporters to establish a radio broadcasting system that millions of people listen to in 110 different languages and dialects across the entire subcontinent?

As Dr. K.P. says in the video, “God can do anything,” but He almost always uses us to accomplish His purposes. Alone, we are nothing. Even together, we cannot do the Lord’s work without His leading and empowerment.

I want to share this video with you so that you, personally, can hear Dr. K.P. share his thanks for your prayers and support of Gospel for Asia (GFA) over the years. It is your trust in the Lord and in the mission of Gospel for Asia (GFA) that has made the amazing ministry possible.

Check out the video and join us in celebrating 40 years of God’s amazing and abundant blessings.

To learn more about what the Lord has done throughout these 40 years, follow this link to our webpage “Gospel for Asia Celebrates Its 40th Year of God’s Faithfulness!”

Gospel for Asia has been serving the “least of these” in Asia since its beginning in 1979, often in places where no one else is serving. GFA supports national workers who are serving as the hands and feet of Christ by ministering to people’s needs so they can understand the love of God for them for the first time. GFA is engaged in dozens of projects, such as caring for poor children, slum dwellers and widows and orphans; providing clean water by funding wells; supporting medical missions; and meeting the needs of those in leprosy colonies. Through GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program, tens of thousands of children are being rescued from the generational curses of poverty and hopelessness.

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2022-11-30T18:14:15+00:00

Last updated on: November 30, 2022 at 6:14 pm   By

WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA) — The Bible speaks of hope specifically as a “confident expectation,” not a wish or a maybe. Dr. KP Yohannan’s vision for establishing Gospel for Asia’s (GFA) Bridge of Hope Program was not simply an idea of something nice to do for the underprivileged children of Asia. The vision was to provide a bridge to the confident expectation of a fruitful and productive future.

I take it for granted that most readers already understand what Bridge of Hope centers do. Faithful supporters have read many stories of individual changed lives of current and former Bridge of Hope students. Many readers, however, may not realize the measurable impact that Bridge of Hope centers have on students achieving the confident expectation of a brighter future.

Is There Really Hope in Gospel for Asia's Bridge of Hope Centers? - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia

Remember What We Do

Bridge of Hope centers serve marginalized and underprivileged children throughout the Asian nations of India, Nepal, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. The purpose is to provide students with the necessary tools and opportunities for success through faithful, qualified staff who provide benefits and programs for each child.

Bridge of Hope centers liberate underprivileged children from the darkness of illiteracy, ignorance and exploitation by complementing formal school education.

They help students to grow emotionally so they do not base their future expectations on the past. Emphasizing a value-based education, students are taught moral values and manners that will prepare them to become good and responsible citizens.

The centers provide social awareness about important health and life issues for both the children and their families. Furthermore, they help to ensure the students’ physical health and growth by providing daily, nutritious meals.

Realize the Results

A recent study of enrichment centers similar to Bridge of Hope revealed some interesting insights into the general efficacy of and impact of our programs.

The overarching finding of the study was that education, in the sense of school attendance, does improve quality of life. Rather, “the major challenge in education today [is] poor learning outcomes.” (Vivek, 2018)

All the evidence indicated that these centers are more effective than public education because children are taught at the level where they are with a view to bringing them to a higher level that will give them the ability to lead productive lives.

A comparison of Grade 5 children indicated a clearly distinguishable difference in reading and math between students at enrichment centers (like Bridge of Hope) and those who attend only a public school.

Public Private
Can read at least a Grade 2 text 41.6% 62.9%
Can divide 21.1% 37.9%

Digging deeper into the educational details, the progress made in reading results at multiple grade levels were even more astounding.

Beginning of Year End of Year
Can read words – Grade 2 16.94% 29.51%
Can read paragraphs – Grade 3 6.98% 13.82%
Can read a story – Grade 4 5.10% 10.37%
Can read and comprehend a story – Grade 5 1.85% 6.22%

The progress in each discipline is double, nearly double, or more than double. Apply that percentage of improvement to 10,000 children, or 50,000 children or 70,000 children.

Statistics tell the story at Bridge or Hope, not only of the present but also of the progress of helping children toward a sure and certain hope for their future, the future of their community, and the future of their country.

Faithful sponsorships make the enrollment in Bridge of Hope centers possible for tens of thousands of children who have no other hope. We will never know this side of heaven how many lives have been changed and how much they have been changed—but we know they are being changed.

Learn more about how to sponsor and help underprivileged children from families stuck in generational abject poverty who need a Bridge of Hope.

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2022-12-10T14:34:00+00:00

Last updated on: December 10, 2022 at 2:34 pm   By

“In our world, one in eight people live in slums. In total, around a billion people live in slum conditions today.”—UN-Habitat Slum Almanac 2015-2016.

Upon reading this fact, my mind almost shut down. An eighth of the world’s population?[1] It seems absurd, but apparently, it is the truth. The reality for those living in slums is harsher than what is reported.

One Story Among Millions Suffering in the Slums - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Maisie (not pictured) is among millions living in slums. Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported workers seek to bring them the love and hope of God.

The Slums: An Explanation

Firstly, what exactly are slums? Merriam Webster defines “slums” as “a densely populated usually urban area marked by crowding, run-down housing, poverty, and social disorganization.”[2] Little to no basic utilities exist in slums. Sanitation facilities, clean water, medical provision are inadequately present in these urban areas. Diseases run rampant, with little to no prevention.[3]

Slum dwellers suffer under these harsh and brutal conditions. These people endure the hardship and poverty around them. Entire families are caught in the endless cycle, with no visible way out. Hopelessness and despair rule their lives.

The Ministry of the Faithful

What is being done to help these people? By the grace of God, many Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported workers toil endlessly among the slums in Asia, bringing hope and love to those in need. Whether it be through prayer, medical care, literacy and vocational classes, gift distributions, water filters, toilets, etc., brothers and sisters minister to those living in these slums.

As I perused the many reports and stories about slums, one in particular caught my attention. The story is of one woman’s return from the brink of desperation and despair. This is Maisie’s story.

A Mother’s Heart Touched

Maisie lives in one of the many slums in Asia. Poverty and destitution were all she had known. Maisie’s husband, Abhaidev, was an alcoholic. Any money he received from his odd jobs went to fuel that addiction. No money for food was left for Maisie and their child. With her stomach empty and her body bruised from the physical abuse heaped upon her by Abhaidev, Maisie couldn’t take it anymore. She decided she would take her own life.

By the grace of God, the very same day she set out for suicide, a neighbor stopped by. This neighbor was a believer and shared Jesus’s love with the desperate woman. The believer gave Maisie a booklet, and the message contained within it transformed her heart.

After learning that she was truly loved, Maisie decided to attend the local church led by Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported pastor Mrithun. After sharing her story with him, Pastor Mrithun prayed for Maisie and encouraged her. That day, Maisie fully recognized the love of God, and no longer wished to end her life.

However, Abhaidev opposed her new faith. He beat Maisie and told her to never go to church again. Maisie refused and continued to pray for her husband. Little by little, the man’s heart softened. Not only did her let her go to church, but he eventually accompanied her!

The Millions Untold

Maisie’s story can be repeated in so many other slums. The destitution and addiction, coupled with abuse and hunger, affect not just the women, but men and children as well. The slums are unforgiving and harsh, but God’s love lifts up and transforms the hardest of hearts. Millions are suffering, but there is hope for them. To learn how you can provide those in slums with hope, visit www.gfa.org/compassion-services/slum-ministry.

[1] U.N. Slum Almanac

[2] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/slum

[3] U.N. Slum Almanac

Source: Gospel for Asia Reports, Restored by the God Who Gave Her Breath

Image Source: Gospel for Asia, Photo of the Day

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2022-09-22T22:08:00+00:00

Last updated on: September 22, 2022 at 10:08 pm   By

Wills Point, Texas – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Special Report Part 3 – Discussing the impact of quality education on the eradication of extreme poverty and illiteracy.

More than 250 million women in Asia are illiterate - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
More than 250 million women in Asia are illiterate. The women pictured learned how to read for the first time through Gospel for Asia supported literacy programs.

Gospel for Asia Introduces Quality Education to Families in Poverty

Remember hardworking Dayita and her roaming children? Their story also serves as an example of the powerful gift of education.

One day, some staff members from a local Gospel for Asia-supported Bridge of Hope center met Dayita and her family. Upon hearing of her struggle and seeing the condition of the family, the staff members offered Dayita’s 7-year-old daughter, Kasni, the chance of a lifetime: the opportunity to go to school.

That day changed the course of Dayita and Kasni’s family: The cycle of poverty and illiteracy began to break.

Dayita’s 7-year-old daughter Kasni is now enrolled in a Bridge of Hope center - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Dayita’s 7-year-old daughter Kasni is now enrolled in a GFA-supported Bridge of Hope center and is learning skills that will enable her to leave the cycle of poverty behind.

At the Bridge of Hope center, Kasni began learning skills that will empower her to escape poverty, subjects such as arithmetic, science, language skill and history. She also had opportunities to learn about art, dance, respect and self-discipline. She thrived in her new environment, and her joy spread to her family.

Dayita had never dreamed she would be able to send her daughter to school, yet now her little Kasni was developing and growing into a bright young student. Kasni’s future would hold more hope than her own had held at age 7, and hopefully Kasni would be spared from many of the trials Dayita had experienced from her illiteracy.

The Bridge of Hope center impacted the family in additional ways, too. Kasni received a nutritious meal every school day, which helped ease the financial burden of the family. She and the other Bridge of Hope students participated in health awareness programs and medical checkups, and all their books and school supplies were provided by the center. In addition, special programs were held regularly to help cultivate students’ social skills and character.

Kasni continued to care for her younger siblings for a portion of the day, and with her new skills of respect and responsibility, she was better equipped in her role as an elder sister.

Many of the things Kasni learned through the center benefited her mother as well. Special programs for the parents helped Dayita grow in knowledge, too.

Kasni is just one among 75,000 children enrolled in GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program. Through Bridge of Hope, these children and their families are finding a new way of life—a life that leads to hope and a door out of poverty.

Teachers at GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers teach with love and care - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Teachers at GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers teach with love and care, which helps the children enjoy class and excel in their studies.

Efforts to Reduce Poverty Through Quality Education

Overwhelming evidence of education’s effectiveness in reducing poverty has prompted massive efforts around the world to make quality education available to everyone—especially to the poor.

Efforts to Reduce Poverty Through Quality Education - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
An instructor plays with kindergarten children at an Internally Displaced Persons camp in Haiti. (Photo credit UNICEF)

These efforts range from large-scale endeavors like those of UNICEF and Global Partnership for Education, to family-run schools and volunteer-led tutoring. Although the groups are different in size, they have one significant component in common: people who are doing what they can to help the needy children in their sphere.

Gospel for Asia (GFA) is just one of those players, yet God is using this one organization to impact thousands of lives. GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program began in 2004 and was designed to help transform the lives of children who live in poverty.

“These children have learned to dream, and their education equips them to pursue those dreams, contribute to society and raise their children-to-come with the same life-changing values they have embraced.”
Recognizing the broad reach poverty has on families and children, Bridge of Hope takes a holistic approach to education, investing in the minds, emotions and bodies of the students. Food, clothing, encouragement, medical care and times of childhood fun all work together to build into the students’ lives and prepare them to be valuable citizens in their countries.

Stories abound of the transformations taking place in these little children—children who are growing up to be well-equipped adults who know they have value and potential. Children who were painfully shy or woefully behind in their studies when they started at Bridge of Hope later dream of becoming doctors, engineers or teachers.

Others aspire to design clothing or to help poverty-stricken families climb out of poverty. Some will grow up to hold positions of great influence in their society, others will help their family farms prosper in improved ways, and still others will invest into the lives of their children the way Bridge of Hope teachers invested in their own lives. These children have learned to dream, and their education equips them to pursue those dreams, contribute to society and raise their children-to-come with the same life-changing values they have embraced.

Just one life changed in a village can multiply to impact hundreds of other lives - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Aayush joined Bridge of Hope at 10 years old. Now a capable young man equipped with a quality education, he is pursuing his goal of becoming a teacher.

As far as which comes first, poverty or lack of education, the answer isn’t clear. But the solution is clear. And when you address one issue, you also address the other. The “magnetic draw” between poverty and education doesn’t only have to pull people down; it can also give the leg up needed to escape both perpetuating cycles.

Despite the magnitude of the task and the global scale at which quality education is needed, we’re talking about individual human lives, each one precious and full of potential. While the statistics of need can be overwhelming, we must stop and celebrate the lives that are being touched and the futures that are being transformed. Just one life changed in a village can multiply to impact hundreds of other lives.

It is good to ask ourselves what our part is in these global efforts. Not everyone is meant to be the leader of a large-scale movement to bring education to the world. Some people need to be teachers; others need to be financial backers for those who are on the frontlines; and others can be advocates for quality education in their own spheres of influence.

What is your part?

Solutions to Poverty Line Problems of the Poor & Impoverished: Part 1 | Part 2

This Special Report article originally appeared on gfa.org

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2022-09-23T00:48:14+00:00

Last updated on: September 23, 2022 at 12:48 am   By

Wills Point, Texas – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Special Report Part 2 – Discussing the impact of educational development on the eradication of extreme poverty.

Education’s Holistic Impact on Family Life, Income

God’s creation of the human mind is a marvelous thing. It has the capacity to imagine, dream, create, cherish, remember, deduce, learn and use logic.

When given opportunities through education to learn, cultivate skills and dream, we are capable of accomplishing extraordinary things. To name a few, these include sending human beings into space, discovering medical breakthroughs, crafting new written languages and rebuilding crumbled economies.

This woman works alongside her husband to make bricks, bringing her infant with her - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
This woman works alongside her husband to make bricks, bringing her infant with her. Both men and women work hard in rural villages to try to make ends meet.

We’ve glimpsed snapshots of what happens when mankind lacks the necessary opportunities to cultivate the amazing mind God has granted him.

Underdeveloped minds and absent opportunities steal much of the influence people could make if they only had a chance.

What does it look like when people with little or no opportunity to receive an education are at last given that chance?

An article posted by Schools & Health states,

“Education is fundamental to sustainable development, it is a powerful driver of development and one of the strongest instruments for reducing poverty and improving health; it enables people to be more productive, to earn a better living and enjoy a better quality of life, while also contributing to a country’s overall economic growth.”[1]

The impact of education on children, families and entire communities affected by poverty is vast and multi-faceted. Let’s consider just a few of the most prominent outcomes of education.

Education’s Impact on Income

Poverty Line Problems of the Impoverished - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Girls study in a UNICEF-supported ‘tent school’ in Afghanistan. Many of their families have been displaced by conflict. (Photo credit UNICEF)

The strong connection between education and income is easy to identify. For every year of primary education received as a child, a worker’s earnings experience a 10 percent increase.[2]

Knowledge of a skill empowers breadwinners to find jobs with better pay and better hours. A literate person in Pakistan earns 23 percent more than an illiterate worker. And in the female workforce, a woman with high literacy skills can earn 95 percent more than an illiterate woman or one who has low literacy skills.[3]

In rural Indonesia, those who finish lower secondary education are twice as likely to escape poverty. In addition, their chances of descending into poverty are reduced by a quarter.[4]

In one study done by an EFA Global Monitoring Report team, findings revealed,

“If all students in low income countries left school with basic reading skills, 171 million people could be lifted out of poverty, which would be equivalent to a 12% cut in world poverty.”[5]

Increased education doesn’t only open new job opportunities for breadwinners; it also enables workers to succeed in their inherited family businesses. Farmers who receive an education are more likely to implement the use of fertilizers and be better equipped to understand the needs of their crops and soil.

Equipped with mathematical skills, a parent can wisely make choices on purchases, contracts and family budgets. And in any business, an increased understanding of finances and mathematics helps guard business owners against being taken advantage of.

If a mother can read, her child is 50 percent more likely to live past the age of 5.

Education’s Impact on Health

By learning how to wash his hands - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
By learning how to wash his hands, this young student in GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program helps his family to be more healthy.

The increase in pay a literate person receives also increases their chance for a healthier life. The extra income buys food for children who might otherwise suffer from malnutrition; it gives the family the option of visiting a doctor for medical treatment—and even better, it enables them to undergo preventative medical care such as regular checkups or vaccinations.

A healthy breadwinner misses fewer days of work than a sickly one, and medical bills demand less from the family budget. But education’s impact on a family’s health extends beyond their improved financial situation.

Education also empowers parents to make wise, healthy choices for their families.

If a mother can read, her child is 50 percent more likely to live past the age of 5.[6] The mother is able to read warning labels and follow those simple instructions intended to protect her family from diseases or accidents.

“Education also empowers parents to make wise, healthy choices for their families.”
In places where education is absent, superstitions abound. Misconceptions on proper health practices endanger grown adults and children alike—especially children in the womb. In the case of one mother in Asia, her lack of education tragically resulted in her child perishing before birth.[7] Sadly, her story is repeated in villages across the globe. Simple health care classes for women who never received education can mean the difference between lost pregnancies and healthy, full-term babies.

One of the most common hygiene practices—hand washing—is virtually unknown in some parts of the world. According to UNICEF,

“Rates of handwashing around the world are low. Observed rates of handwashing with soap at critical moments—i.e., before handling food and after using the toilet—range from zero percent to 34 percent.”

As a result, easily avoided illnesses are claiming millions of lives. Every year, diarrhea claims the lives of more than 1.5 million children under the age of 5; proper handwashing practices can reduce diarrhea by more than 40 percent.[8]

A person’s health impacts their education as well: A study among primary schools in China with active hand-washing promotions and distributions of soap identified that students missed 54 percent fewer days of school compared to students whose schools had no such program.[9]

No country can really develop unless its citizens are educated - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia

No country can really develop unless its citizens are educated.Nelson Mandela

Education Development and It’s Impact on Society

There is power in education. “No country can really develop unless its citizens are educated,” said Nelson Mandela.[10]

“Education inspires dreams and equips citizens to pursue their goals.”
Education inspires dreams and equips citizens to pursue their goals. The resulting entrepreneurial efforts help boost economies and create jobs, which aids in global efforts to eliminate poverty.

Literacy is also key to being informed about what is taking place around the world. It builds global awareness into a person’s heart and enables them to engage with others in ways that are impossible without literacy.

The UN states that “quality early education provides children with basic cognitive and language skills and fosters emotional development.”[11] Alternatively, an estimated US$129 billion is lost each year due to the 250 million children globally who are not learning basic skills (and thus have less potential).[12] The importance of quality education on society is revealed by its inclusion in the UN’s global Sustainable Development Goals.[13]

Ashima once faced punishment at school and scolding at home - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
Ashima once faced punishment at school and scolding at home because her family could not afford the school supplies she needed. After she enrolled in Bridge of Hope, which provided for all of her school needs, plus many other gifts to support Ashima’s development, she shares, “My future ambition is that I want to become a medical doctor. Especially I want to serve the poor from our society.”

Beyond influencing the economy of a society, education also touches the fibers of morals and lifestyles in a region.

According to Professor W. Steven Barnett, author of Preschool Education and Its Lasting Effects: Research and Policy Implications, a child’s academic success can be impacted by early childhood education, which can also reduce incidences of crime and delinquency.[14]

“Beyond influencing the economy of a society, education also touches the fibers of morals and lifestyles in a region.”
The National Scientific Council on the Developing Child confirms that a person’s childhood heavily influences their mental, physical and emotional development, with children raised in secure, loving environments thriving more than children who have experienced trauma even one time.[15]

Do you remember the joy you felt as a child when you did something well in school? The sense of accomplishment and the praise from a teacher or parent give courage and confidence to approach other challenges in life. In the same way, the shame felt when encountering failure can hinder children in life. If a child grows up with a constant sense of failure and insufficiency, that can result in low self-esteem and lack of confidence.

Training children at an early age to pursue their goals and giving them the tools they need to succeed prepare them to thrive in the future challenges they will face as adults.

Solutions to Poverty Line Problems of the Poor & Impoverished: Part 1 | Part 3

This Special Report article originally appeared on gfa.org

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: Youtube | Twitter | GFA Reports | My GFA | Instagram

2019-10-26T21:14:51+00:00

Last updated on: October 26, 2019 at 9:14 pm   By

literWills Point, Texas – Gospel for Asia (GFA) Special Report Part 1 – Discussing the impact of education on the eradication of extreme poverty and illiteracy.When considering the issues of poverty and lack of education, an old saying comes to mind: “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”

Poverty and low education are each self-perpetuating: Those born into poverty (or illiterate households) often live the remainder of their lives in that same condition and have nothing more to offer their children.[1] What’s more, it is as if poverty and low education have a magnetic attraction, relentlessly pulling those who are caught in one cycle deep into the other too.

Why is that?

Solutions to Poverty Line Problems of the Poor & Impoverished Part 1 - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia

Kristina Birdsong, a writer for Scientific Learning, sums up the relationship between poverty and education by saying,

“Today more than ever, education remains the key to escaping poverty, while poverty remains the biggest obstacle to education.”[2]

Let’s look at one example:

Dayita was forced to become the sole provider for her four children - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
With her husband out of the picture, illiterate Dayita was forced to become the sole provider for her four children.

Dayita is a mother in Asia living with four children. Poverty and illiteracy permeated her village and her life. Dayita’s husband had consumed so much alcohol that he became too sick to work or even get out of bed, which meant Dayita had no choice but to be the family’s sole breadwinner.

But she was illiterate.

What job opportunities did she have? Manual labor. She and many other illiterate women in her area collected firewood from nearby forests and sold it to provide for their families. It was physically taxing work that kept her from being with her children and still paid very little. But it was all she could do.

Education remains the key to escaping poverty, while poverty remains the biggest obstacle to education.

Dayita’s illiteracy and poverty set the trajectory of her children’s lives, too. The fight to obtain morsels of bread for their hungry tummies consumed all her strength; sending her children to school was not even something to dream about. And Dayita couldn’t teach her children anything of the alphabet or of mathematics, knowing none herself. Instead of going to school, her four kids roamed around the village, “cared for” by the eldest child, 7-year-old Kasni.

The cycles of poverty and illiteracy were continuing in Dayita’s family, and there was nothing she could do to arrest them.

These women are working on road construction project in Asia - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
These women are working on road construction project in Asia. Around the world, women are more likely to be paid less than men and to face unemployment.

Poverty and It’s Pervasive Stranglehold

Dayita was not alone in her plight.

An estimated 767 million people lived below the poverty line of $1.90 per day in 2013, according to the UN.[3] In 2014, some 263 million children and youth were not attending school, and more than 70 percent of the out-of-school children who should have been in primary or secondary education lived in sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia.[4] In the United States, a report revealed that in 2014, “approximately 15 million children under the age of 18 were in families living in poverty.”[5]

Living hand to mouth
KILLS DREAMS.

Many impoverished families know education is the long-term solution to their financial troubles, but it is out of reach. A family’s financial position influences more than you might think upon initial consideration.

The father who works from sunup to sundown seven days a week will have little time to mentor his children. The same could be said of the mother who labors in the fields all day.

During their most formative and vulnerable years, millions of children are left alone during the day to wander in their villages. Many will adopt poor social habits and learn nothing of respect or self-discipline. School is out of the picture for them; all the family’s energy must be focused on providing food and shelter.

A young boy in Pakistan. One in three Pakistanis lives below the poverty line - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
A young boy in Pakistan. One in three Pakistanis lives below the poverty line. Photo Credit Muhammad Muzamil / Unsplash

Often, a family’s financial plight is so desperate that even young children must contribute to the family income. For the roughly 150 million child laborers in the world,[6] there is no school, no delving into their nation’s history, and no adventuring to museums to learn about science and art.

No money means no food, which means malnutrition and increased health problems. No money means no doctor visits, and in the case of a medical emergency, no money may mean indenturing a child to work off the incurred debt after receiving critical treatment.

“Living hand to mouth kills dreams. For many, ambition becomes unrealistic amid the ever-present fight against starvation.”
Living hand to mouth kills dreams. For many, ambition becomes unrealistic amid the ever-present fight against starvation. How many of us have asked a young child what they want to be when they grow up? In many poverty-stricken areas, however, a child might respond to that question with a look of confusion. The only future they can see is following their parents in becoming a farmer, a daily laborer or, if they’re lucky, maybe a skilled tradesman.

For the majority of children raised in poverty-stricken communities, the fruit of their harsh childhood is more of the same. When they become parents, they will raise their children as they themselves were raised—unless they can manage to find a way out, into a new way of life.

Both men and women work hard in rural villages to try to make ends meet - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia
This woman works alongside her husband to make bricks, bringing her infant with her. Both men and women work hard in rural villages to try to make ends meet.

Solutions to Poverty Line Problems of the Poor & Impoverished: Part 2 | Part 3

This Special Report article originally appeared on gfa.org

To read more on the ongoing worldwide problem of Poverty on Patheos, go here.

Click here, to read more blogs on Patheos from Gospel for Asia.

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: Facebook | Youtube | Twitter | GFA Reports | My GFA

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