Technology Shares Christ’s Love with a Village

Last updated on: December 1, 2018 at 11:26 pm By GFA Staff Writer

Often times, people will argue the pros and cons of different methods of sharing Christ’s love. I used to be that way, but after reading articles from various missionary organizations, I’ve learned there is no method that is effective for every individual.

For many people in other countries, illiteracy is a problem. In India more than 34 percent of the population is illiterate.^[1] Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia have a literacy rate higher than 75 percent, but that still leaves portions of the population illiterate.^[2]

This is why digital media, such as films, are such great tools. It shares the Good News with those who can’t read a Bible or literature. Plus, who doesn’t like a good movie, especially when the good guy ultimately wins?

Struggling with Sweat on Their Way

Technology Shares Christ’s Love with a Village - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Aadit (pictured) is part of a GFA-supported film team and seeks to share Christ’s love through showing films about Jesus’ life.

GFA-supported film teams often travel on foot, from village to village, with sweat running down their faces. Unless they travel by bus or have their own vehicle, they have no other way to haul the projector and generator, which they use for power in rural areas that have no electricity.^[3] Aadit, a GFA-supported missionary and his team walked and carried a projector on a narrow path leading to a village.^[4]

An Unexpected Treat

I can’t imagine how heavy film projectors are, yet these men believed it would be worth carrying so those who have never heard of God’s love would finally have the chance.

Many in the West take movies for granted. Movie theaters are just a few minutes from home. Almost every house has a DVD or Blue Ray player. Movies are no longer a novelty. But in many rural villages across the globe, films are a rare occurrence. In the village where Aadit was showing the film about Jesus, villagers had no way to visit a movie theater. So when the team arrived with equipment in tow, excitement stirred around the village.

The film team prayed for the work of the Holy Spirit to be present and for changed hearts. That night, as the film was shown, the audience grew to around 95 people.

As villagers watched the film displaying what Jesus had done for them, 10 people were moved and embraced the Lord’s love in their lives.

Movies Share Christ’s Love with Others

You never know how the Lord will work in people’s lives to draw them to Himself. For people who are illiterate, it may be as simple as watching a movie. Through the work of national missionaries such as Aadit, families are coming to love Christ and people are seeing His message of hope for the first time.

Whether you use literature, prefer conversations or showing a movie, people will react to the message of Christ’s love and sacrifice in different ways. The Holy Spirit is able to work in our feeble efforts to bring people to Himself.

^[1] The New Leam, Alarming Illiteracy Rates in India: Accountability and Action

^[2] Discovery DCODE, How Did Southeast Asia Achieve 99% Literacy?

^[3] Gospel for Asia, Provide gifts that help missionaries bring Christ’s love to the lost

^[4] Gospel for Asia: Reports from the Field, A Surprise Film

To learn more about the National Missionaries, visit this page on the GFA website.

Learn more about the GFA Film Ministry in Asia and how you can be involved, go here.

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Seeking Justice & Defending Human Rights (Part 3 by Gospel for Asia)

Last updated on: November 20, 2019 at 3:37 am By GFA Staff Writer

Wills Point, Texas – GFA Special Report (Gospel for Asia) – Discussing the large and small scale efforts and solutions to end inequality, social injustice, grinding poverty, human rights violations, that continues to exist, affecting millions of women, men and even children.

Small Steps, Big Change

In the face of such enormous inequalities, it can be difficult to know how to respond and where to start. But just as the problem of social injustice is not really a single, abstract issue so much as the many individuals it affects, so ending inequality is about changing personal circumstances as well as addressing the structures that allow inequality to continue.

That sort of action is taking place on large and small scales. At one end of the spectrum, the World Bank is supporting a $63 million empowerment project in Jharkhand, India, which aims to help adolescent girls and young women complete secondary-level education and acquire job skills.

A microfinance loan enabled this woman to buy a water buffalo and keep her family out of the cycle of poverty - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — A microfinance loan enabled this woman to buy a water buffalo and keep her family out of the cycle of grinding poverty. She washes the buffalo every day to ensure it does not get sick.

Another way of improving the situation for poor families has been providing microloans that keep them away from predatory loan sharks. Many families have found themselves caught in bonded labor for generations after borrowing a small sum, only for their debt to keep spiraling beyond their reach.

The “Jeevika” program launched a decade ago in Bihar, India, by the state and national Indian government has seen some 600,000 women helped to start small businesses as farmers, dairy and poultry producers and entrepreneurs in small businesses.

“These women are also emerging as a political and social force,” notes India Spend.

The 2016 Global Gender Gap Report by the World Economic Forum concludes that at its current rate of progress, it will take South Asia an entire millennium to reach gender equality in the workplace.

Increasingly aware of living in a globalized economy, where production is outsourced to where labor may be cheapest, some in the West are recognizing how their spending may affect the poor in other parts of the world.

“Ending inequality is about changing personal circumstances as well as addressing the structures that allow inequality to continue.”

Yet while encouraging Western consumers to challenge companies about their supply chain practices, to ensure they are not supporting sweatshop businesses, groups like ASI don’t advocate boycotts.

Such actions “can actually make the situation worse and undermine the economy of an already poor country,” says the organization. “As well as hurting employers using slavery-like practices, they could also hurt those who are not exploiting their workers, and worsen the [grinding poverty] that is one of the root causes of slavery.”

Sewing machine provides a widow with dignity and a way to earn an income despite the loss of a spouse - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Sewing machine provides a widow with dignity and a way to earn an income despite the loss of a spouse.

Gospel for Asia Fights Grinding Poverty in Asia on a Local Level

Complex though the issues are, simple actions can make a difference. Through a wide range of services and programs, Gospel for Asia (GFA) is working among Asia’s poor to offer help and hope for a better tomorrow. And GFA can testify that even a small gift for a family can create big change.

Vocational training courses that cost just $30 can teach skills like fishing, welding and tailoring to equip men for better-paying work. For $75, GFA provides tool kits that may include items like axes, shovels, saws and plows, which enable farmers to increase their productivity.

An $85 donation supplies a sewing machine that allows men and women to start a home-based business, rather than being dependent on others. Not only does this mean they can work from home and take better care of their children, it also multiplies their income significantly. Many who have received a machine say they no longer feel they need to keep their children from school to help make money.

The gift of a bicycle rickshaw can change the financial situation of an entire family - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — The gift of a bicycle rickshaw can change the financial situation of an entire family, and life them out of grinding poverty in Asia.

Costing $200, a rickshaw opens up a whole new level of opportunity for a family. Instead of having to rent a vehicle at often high rates, rickshaw drivers can keep all their earnings from ferrying passengers and products around.

Gospel for Asia also helps to ensure that a family’s situation improves beyond one generation, by encouraging parents to keep their children free from the burden of work. Indeed, GFA sees education as important as equipment, if not more so, in bringing about long-term change.

Currently, around 75,000 children are enrolled in GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers, where they are helped with their schooling and holistic development. Since 2004, many others have come through this program, which also provides food and medical checkups.

The importance of greater access to education, especially for women and girls, cannot be emphasized enough. Funding such efforts “isn’t charity but investment, and the returns are transformational,” notes activist and singer Bono in a recent opinion piece for TIME magazine in which he asserts that “poverty is sexist.”

GFA's Bridge of Hope program helps about long-term change in families and gives the next generation a chance for a better future - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — GFA’s Bridge of Hope program helps about long-term change in families and gives the next generation a chance for a better future—one where they can rise above the cycle of grinding poverty.

When girls get an extra year’s schooling, their wages increase by almost 12 percent, he writes. Closing the gender gap in education could generate up to $152 billion a year for developing countries.

“When you invest in girls and women,” he goes on, “they rise and they lift their families, their communities, their economies and countries along with them.”

One example of that is recounted in Global Fund for Women’s (GFW) Breaking Through report on gender equality in Asia and the Pacific. After joining a women’s self-help group, a 29-year-old became the first housewife elected to the panchayat, or local government, also helping win equal pay for equal work for women at a local factory.

New opportunities have opened up for the more than 100,000 women who have completed one of GFA’s literacy courses. Another 30,000 women are currently taking part in the program, which is offered in 16 languages.

"When you invest in girls and women, they rise and they lift their families - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — “When you invest in girls and women, they rise from grinding poverty and they lift their families, their communities, their economies and countries along with them.”

One graduate of the GFA-supported literacy program told how learning to read at the age of 40 had changed her life. “I have been deceived many times because of my illiteracy,” says Baasima.

“When I used to go for shopping, bad shopkeepers deceived me, taking more money and not returning the balance amount. But now I can calculate myself. They cannot deceive me. I am very happy now.”

Learning to read has not only enabled Baasima and others to provide and care for their families better-the health of your child is endangered when you can’t read a prescription they may need-but it has also raised their standing in their communities. And along with that improved status can come a new sense of personal worth and identity as they discover God’s love for them in the pages of the Bible.

Literacy training enables women to care better for their families and increases their sense of self-worth - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Literacy training enables women to care better for their families and increases their sense of self-worth.

Indeed, all of GFA’s efforts to address the inequalities that press down on millions across Asia are anchored in the belief that true social justice means not only seeking better opportunities for all economically and educationally, but also spiritually-the chance to hear of a God who loves all equally, and to see that love demonstrated through actions that help lift them up.

While GFA celebrates the attention that the annual World Day of Social Justice brings to the plight of the overlooked and down-trodden and the enormity of the challenge, it quietly works year-round to change things one person at a time, echoing the approach of Mother Teresa, who remarked of her years caring for some of India’s poor that, “There are no great acts, only small acts done with great love.”

GFA-supported workers seek to walk out the call of the prophet Isaiah (1:17, NIV):

Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.”

Seeking Justice and Defending Human Rights: Part 1 | Part 2

This article originally appeared on gfa.org

To read more on Patheos on the global problem of grinding poverty, go here.

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

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Seeking Justice & Defending Human Rights (Part 2 by Gospel for Asia)

Last updated on: November 20, 2019 at 3:39 am By GFA Staff Writer

Wills Point, Texas – GFA Special Report (Gospel for Asia) – Discussing the human rights injustice and violations, modern-day oppression, extreme poverty, that continues to exist, affecting millions of women, men and even children.

Human Rights Injustice in Social Structures

For those who are considered “Untouchables”—that’s some 300 million Dalits who fall at the bottom of the societal ladder—discrimination typically leaves them with only menial work no one else wants to do.

The Indian government took affirmative action to enforce policies about caste discrimination “reserving a certain percentage of government jobs and admission to educational institutions, as also financial support through loans and special schemes, for these castes,” reports the CRG.

The Dalit Enterprise in India promotes inclusivity and supports Dalit entrepreneurs - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — The Dalit Enterprise in India promotes inclusivity and supports Dalit entrepreneurs. (Photo credit dalitenterprise.com)

Some Dalits have managed to break out of their long-time social, religious and economic confinement. Recently launched, The Dalit Enterprise celebrates the rise of entrepreneurs from among the Dalits, among whom are around 50 billionaires.

But such successes are often the exception rather than the rule. Seven decades after the government first introduced measures to address the caste issue, CRG’s Sagar notes that “there is not a single positive indicator of social development” where lower castes feature prominently.

“Whether it is land holdings, income, literacy, nutrition or health status, it is these sections-who constitute one-third of India’s population-that are right at the bottom of the pile,” he says.

Migrant workers endure discrimination and social injustices too. In the 2018 Human Rights Watch Report on Sri Lanka, WHO reports that “The government took some steps to protect the [human rights] of more than 1 million migrant workers in the Middle East and other parts of Asia, but many continued to face long working hours with little rest, delayed or unpaid wages, confinement in the workplace, and verbal, physical, and sexual abuse.”

“There’s so much improvement and progress in this world,” she said. “But for us, nothing has changed. We’re still in the same hell.”

Cultural attitudes also often limit women’s opportunities to work; they are expected to stay home and look after their families. Female participation rates in the workforce are low in the entire region, while only one in three women in Bangladesh participates, says the World Bank.

Most people in this woman's village are laborers at a brick factory - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Most people in this woman’s village are laborers at a brick factory. Women are often “invisible” workers in brick kilns, vulnerable to exploitation and having little to no rights.

Women working in brick kilns as part of a bonded labor family are what ASI calls “invisible”—not even formally registered on the employment roll, with wages paid only to their husbands.

Often forced to work in what are called “vulnerable” occupations, informal employment where they have no human rights, women are more susceptible to financial exploitation.

Pushed to the fringes, women may be forced to do jobs others refuse, like Suneeta. She told Germany’s Deutsche Welle how she had been a manual scavenger—cleaning latrines by hand for 20 years to feed her family.

“There’s so much improvement and progress in this world,” she said. “But for us, nothing has changed. We’re still in the same hell.”

Widows are particularly vulnerable, often shunned because they are considered cursed and left to beg or even forced into prostitution.

Frequently involved in “cultural employment”—handcrafts and similar arts-based fields—women are more likely to have to supplement their income with more than one job, says the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) report Precarious situation for women working in the field of culture.

Grinding poverty in Asia often starts with the women - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Grinding poverty in Asia often starts with the women.

Females at Risk Due to Grinding Poverty, Human Rights Violated

Illiteracy is a dangerous factor. The more than 250 million women across Asia who are unable to read are vulnerable to exploitation—unable to understand an employment contract (if they are given one) or the details of a loan they may need to take out—and at risk of being cheated when they spend their money.

There are health consequences, too. In a University of California, Berkeley paper, The Rural-Urban Divide in India, Tathagato Chakraborty writes that lack of educational opportunities for girls “increases the fertility rate, maternal and infant mortality, and malnutrition in the family.” With little education, basic hygiene practices may remain unknown. Furthermore, because the human rights of women to land and property are rarely recognized, “this increases the risk of poverty to women and their families and increases poverty overall as women and children make up two-thirds of the population.”

This girl takes care of her younger sister while her mother works at a tea plantation - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — This girl takes care of her younger sister while her mother works at a tea plantation. Even when the mother is breastfeeding, she often still goes to work because she cannot miss her quota of picking tea leaves.

Then there is violence and abuse, physical and sexual. Many young girls are kept away from school not only because they are required to work, but also for fear they may be attacked on the way to school or while they are there, according to the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP).

Indeed, the World Health Organization names gender-based violence as “a significant public health concern in the South-East Asia Region,” and “one of the most pervasive human rights violations.”

Girls are “particularly vulnerable to the negative impacts of child labor,” says the ILO, comprising the bulk of children in “some of the most dangerous forms of child labor, including forced and bonded labor, commercial sexual exploitation and domestic work outside of their home.”

Part of the problem is that attitudes are slow to change, as noted last year by Dr. Poonam Khetrapal Singh, WHO regional director for South-East Asia, when he introduced the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

“Gender inequality is at the root of violence against women,” he said. “Beliefs and practices that value women less than men are normalized, excused and tolerated—a substantial proportion of adolescent girls and boys believe that a husband is justified in beating his wife for at least one reason.”

Realizing that millions of women in India have become exposed to sexual assaults each year simply because of the lack of toilets, the government of India has taken up the task of building toilets and latrines in the rural parts of the nation. The construction of toilets under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s dream project, Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (Clean India Mission), has gained momentum, with many NGO’s (like Sulabh International) joining the initiative. Gospel for Asia helped to build and install more than 10,000 toilets in 2016.

Seeking Justice and Defending Human Rights: Part 1 | Part 3

This article originally appeared on gfa.org

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7 Things You Didn’t Know About Gospel for Asia Supported Bridge of Hope Centers

Last updated on: November 5, 2018 at 6:52 am By GFA Staff Writer

Wills Point, Texas – GFA (Gospel for Asia) – Discussing how GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers change the lives of children, their families, and in turn their communities.

1.8 million Indian babies succumb to death annually from effects of malnutrition and diseases.

150,000 infant deaths per month
34,615 deaths per week
4,945 deaths per day
206 deaths per hour

The sad plight of the surviving children living in poverty in South Asia is impossible for our minds to comprehend unless we have seen it with our own eyes.

These children wake up every morning in squalor, waste, rubbish and odors—not unlike survivors of a tornado, hurricane or earthquake experience. The major difference for these children is that every morning is the same. For these children and their families, there is no likelihood for a better future. There is no hope.

Watch this short (1:14) video to understand what life is like for many of these children living in unspeakable circumstances.

GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers have been changing the prospects for the lives of tens of thousands of children every year since 2004.

Most people familiar with GFA’s Bridge of Hope Program can summarize the work as education, nutrition and healthcare. Certainly, Bridge of Hope centers provide these three key elements, but they do much more than that.

Here are 7 things you may not have realized that Bridge of Hope centers provide:

1. Emotional Growth

Bridge of Hope staff seeks to help each child achieve emotional maturity and a sense of confidence that are essential strengths for a balanced life. Children are encouraged not to base their future on the past, but to move on to their full potential.

2. Building Character

Bridge of Hope emphasizes a disciplined, value-based environment, which builds character. The goal is to prepare children to become good responsible citizens of their nation. The children regularly learn moral values and manners that enable them to respect authority and care for the needs of others.

3. Social Responsibility

The children at Bridge of Hope centers are taught social awareness through participation in rallies and programs on social issues such as HIV/ AIDS, tuberculosis, illiteracy, child labor and unhealthy habits such as smoking, drinking and tobacco use.

4. Assisting Parents

Staff invest not only in the children but also in their parents. Staff members visit parents and conduct special training programs for them. Topics covered include general awareness on child care, health and hygiene, good parenting, child labor and family planning.

5. Equipping Parents

Bridge of Hope offers parents literacy and tailoring classes so they can earn a better living and improve their circumstances and those of their family.

6. Vocational Training

Bridge of Hope helps parents learn how to succeed in self-employment by providing them with self-sustainable gifts such as livestock, sewing machines, bicycles and push trolleys for street vending.

7. Community Involvement

Bridge of Hope centers provide opportunities for children and their families to improve and care for their surroundings by planting trees and helping neighbors.

More than anything else, the millions of children in South Asia need to know they are loved, that someone cares about them and they can have a life filled with a real hope for a better future.

We cannot help the millions by ourselves, but each child we do help is a family impacted. Each family impacted can bring improvement and change to an entire community.

Please pray for the dedicated staff members of each Bridge of Hope center. Pray that the love of Jesus will be obvious whether they are teaching literacy, cooking meals or encouraging parents.

Please pray for the children. Pray they will be attentive and apply what they have been taught. Pray that our efforts on the Lord’s behalf will change their precious lives for the better forever.

To read more posts on Patheos on Bridge of Hope, go here.

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

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: Flickr | GFA | GFA.org | Facebook | Youtube

Sources:

Gospel for Asia, K.P. Yohannan – Welcoming the Children Pt.2
Bridge of Hope website, What We Do
Bridge of Hope website, Our History
Gospel for Asia, Photo of the Day

Bridge of Hope Education and Transformation

Last updated on: December 8, 2022 at 2:48 pm By GFA Staff Writer

Wills Point, Texas – GFA (Gospel for Asia) – Discussing how GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers give education and transformation in the lives of children.

In a meeting at the United Nations on September 25, the leaders of France, Canada and Great Britain made a case for the UN to focus concerted efforts on educating young girls.

Sight Magazine reports, “More than 130 million girls . . . do not attend school, according to the World Bank, costing as much as $US30 trillion in lost earnings and productivity.”

Meanwhile, The Atlantic published an article that boys don’t read enough and that “girls tend to do almost everything more thoroughly than boys.”

GFA has recognized the need for better education in developing countries, and we have been providing teaching through GFA-supported Bridge of Hope centers throughout Asia. The centers address the needs of impoverished children with education, healthy meals and basic health care.

Anyone who is familiar with Bridge of Hope (BOH) already understands those three prongs of our ministry to these children.

While the work of the BOH centers offer these three essentials, they are neither all that they provide nor are they all the children need. While they need literacy, nutrition and health care, much more will be required for them to succeed in life.

1. Emotional Growth

Bridge of Hope staff seeks to help each child achieve emotional maturity and a sense of confidence, which are essential strengths for a balanced life. We encourage them not to base their future on the past, but to move on to their full potential.

2. Character Building

Bridge of Hope emphasizes a disciplined value-based education that builds character. The goal is to prepare children to become good responsible citizens of their nation. The children regularly learn moral values and manners that enable them to respect authority and care for the needs of others.

3. Involvement of Their Families

Bridge of Hope staff invest not only in the children but also in their parents. Our staff members visit parents/guardians and conduct special training programs for them and the community. Topics covered include general awareness on child care, health and hygiene, good parenting and other topics to help them provide a better home environment in which their children can be encouraged and prosper.

Education alone is not the solution to the world’s problems, although it is often touted as if it were. Certainly, it is an essential part.

Likewise, our growth—growth that forges a path to a life lived rightly—must include social skills, respect, moral wisdom and kindness for others as well as accumulating knowledge.

Our hope and our prayers for Bridge of Hope students is that they will grow as well-rounded and wise persons who understand how to navigate through life and how to help others to do so as well. Our goal is that they will find wisdom and a love that will transform them forever.

Pray for our Bridge of Hope centers. Pray for the children. Pray for the staff.

Ask the Lord how you can help to support this great work.

To read more posts on Patheos on Bridge of Hope, go here.

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

Go here to know more about Gospel for Asia: GFA.net | Wiki | Flickr | GFA | GFA.org

Sources:

Bridge of Hope, What We Do
Sight Magazine, World leaders warn failure to educate girls will cause “catastrophes”
Believers Church, Bridge of Hope
The Voice of America, World Leaders Stress Need to Educate Girls
The Atlantic, Boys Don’t Read Enough

Gendercide: The Ultimate Violence Against Women

Last updated on: April 20, 2021 at 6:42 pm By GFA Staff Writer

Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, Texas – Discussing the topic of gendercide.

Whoever dreamed up the idea of gender reveals was onto something fun. Have you seen them on social media? Sometimes, they’re baby shower games or scavenger hunts that bring the participants ever closer to finding out the big secret. Sometimes, they’re clever videos. One of the most bittersweet examples was for a military wife whose husband had been killed in action before meeting his new child. His fellow soldiers made a video of the big reveal with a shower of pink tissue paper and confetti descending as they cheered for the new baby girl.

Gender reveals have surprise endings by nature: something pink or something blue. In America, we tend to cheer for girls and boys, alike. In parts of Asia, the happiness scale dips heavily in favor of boys. Many girls never have confetti, applause or even a chance at life beyond the earliest days of protection in their mother’s tummy.

Selective Abortion Accounts for an Untold Number of Missing Girls

Would you say that you’re undecided about whether or not gendercide is okay? Certainly, the answer is, “No!” How about eugenics? More than one notorious, historical figure has proclaimed that culling people they believed were bad for society was a good thing for all. But there is a direct connection between abortion, gendercide and eugenics. No matter where you stand on the vitriolic issue of abortion, one undeniable truth exists: when a child is aborted because of its gender, that abortion is gendercide.

In many parts of Asia, gendercide is real and it’s not uncommon. Along with improved access to prenatal care comes one of the most common procedures that any pregnant woman undergoes. But the ultrasound that so many mothers and fathers eagerly await can quickly turn into a death sentence if it doesn’t reveal a boy.

It’s difficult to separate the issue of choice from that of violence against women when choice is used to exterminate the life of a girl child specifically because she is female. Even worse, if that’s possible, is the fact that the choice is usually not their own. Heartbroken women are forced into abortions by aggressive and abusive family members. What happens in truth is often much different from what should happen on paper.

Sex Selection Continues After Babies are Born

If you have read this far, you might already be in turmoil. There is more. Gendercide isn’t just practiced during pregnancy. Especially in poorer parts of Asia, it continues after birth. An unwanted girl child isn’t inherently safe just because she managed to make it into the world. Some people have no compunction about terminating the life of a precious little girl even after they have seen her face, held her and heard those first sweet baby sounds.

Unimaginably, some girls approaching school age are killed because they are both female and unwanted. The BBC reported in 2011 that there are millions of missing girls. According to The Atlantic, girls 5 years old and under are killed in abusive homes as an extension of gender selection, violence against women, and general contempt for the lives of females of any age.

Infanticide, which specifically is killing a child after birth, isn’t new, and it isn’t unique to South Asia, but it is likely underreported. Societies the world over have expressed a fondness for boys. The most frequently cited reasoning is to carry on the family name.

The World Bank expands on the terrible, regrettable practice in their report, Violence Against Women and Girls: Lessons From South Asia. They found that infanticide is the “most direct postnatal driver of excess female child mortality” throughout South Asia. Sadly, the mindset that girls are less than boys and that violence against girls is tolerable persists from birth until death, oftentimes an early death.

For girls who survive infanthood, laws forbid violence against women. That sounds like a step in the right direction. But the realities lie elsewhere, not within those pages.

In major cities and small villages across Asia, women and girls are often at a very literal, daily risk of being attacked, raped and killed. The law does little to help, even when it does manage to overcome its apathy toward those who harm women. Sometimes, attackers end the lives of their victims. But sometimes, a girl’s family plays an equally heinous role in her untimely end.

It doesn’t take much search time to find news story after news story of girls who were raped by a man or group of men, and then beaten or killed by her parents or extended family for bringing their so-called shame back to their family’s threshold. In some places and in some families, just being a girl must feel like a crime.

Gendercide Has Far-Reaching Effects

If you wonder how anyone could kill a child, regardless of whether or not they’ve been born, you’re in good company. But beyond the most obvious terror of killing girls and girl babies, the longstanding practice has far-reaching, damaging effects to a society.

According to Institut National d’Etudes Démographiques (INED), the proportion of boys born in Asia “is abnormally high because couples practice sex-selective abortion.” These imbalanced birth rates affect marriages and population growth long into the future.

Although many Asian families treasure their little girls as much as they do boys, girls come at a cost. That cost is the most common reasoning behind gendercide.

A boy will grow up, marry, have children of his own, and will always contribute to the welfare of the family that raised him. For girls, it’s different. Girls are married off. The families that raise them, feed them and clothe them will eventually need a dowry just to watch them leave for their husband’s home. Dowries were largely outlawed decades ago, but the traditional practice is still observed.

Girls are expensive and then they leave. Boys are also expensive, but they’re an investment that has the potential to pay off later. It’s a very sad truth that’s difficult to leave in the past.

INED explains that the girl/boy imbalance in Asia also has a practical problem. It affects the way men find the wives who will join their family and bear the next generation.

With so many girl babies killed, fewer and fewer women are available to marry later. Some men must find wives elsewhere, which accounts for a growing female migration trend. And some men wait until they’re older to find a wife and marry, which, in an ironic twist, can exacerbate the so-called problem of having daughters.

Men play the deciding role in the sex of their children. The older a man is when he fathers a child, the greater his chance of fathering a daughter. According to Psychology Today, the likelihood of older men having fewer sons is well-documented. Two-thirds of girls, they explain, are born to parents over the age of 40. Every year, a man’s chance of having a son decreases by 1 percent. And so the cycle grows as it continues.

Gendercide is violence against women. There are no two ways around it. In families where women of all ages are not uniformly treasured as precious children of God, but sometimes merely tolerated, it shouldn’t be a surprise. Killing a girl child who can run and skip and laugh is bound to be more difficult than aborting a female baby who hasn’t taken her first breath. But both practices have equally disastrous and heartbreaking consequences for the child, her family and society.

For girls who are allowed to live, life may become harder than anyone could ever deserve. Some girls are put to work before they’re old enough to enter school. Again, laws may forbid child labor, but that doesn’t mean it’s uncommon. Many surviving girls are underfed and neglected, with boys getting a better share of food, care and education. Marriage for girls may come at an unusually young age. Then she takes on her role as the extremely hopeful mother of precious boys, and probably also girls whose fates lie in someone else’s hands.

Gender reveal games and parties almost seem like a silly decadence when judged alongside the plight and even terror of abused women and girls in Asia. But they’re not. Every child God creates is precious in his sight, just like the nursery song taught to us in Sunday School. Every baby deserves confetti and a celebration just because they exist. Every girl deserves parents who protect and care about her. Every woman deserves a warm, loving family where she is safe from discrimination and abuse.

Someone must help the women and girls in Asia. Gospel for Asia (GFA) supports the devoted workers who are on the job.

Missionaries, pastors and everyday people reach out to their communities with programs that offer the resources they desperately need. Through kindness and generosity of spirit, they educate whole communities. Through earnest compassion, they share the love of God with women who may never have known any life besides one of pain and abuse.

Gospel for Asia (GFA) supports literacy training, health care education, Bridge of Hope programs for children, and tools that help women earn much-needed income, which helps communities learn to value women, and helps women to understand that they are valuable.

Read more articles on Patheos about gendercide: 1 2 3

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Caring for Women & Providing Clean Water Serve “The Least of These”

Last updated on: September 13, 2023 at 10:40 am By GFA Staff Writer

Caring for Women & Providing Clean Water Serve - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — National missionaries provide hope and help to women with desperate needs all across Asia, and thereby serve the least of these.

Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, TX – Discussing what motivates us to serve “the least of these”.

Driven by a passion to serve people Jesus referred to as “the least of these,” in 1979, Dr. KP Yohannan led a group of prayer believers to establish Gospel for Asia with a vision to turn the passion into practice.

Putting Our Passion into Practice to Serve the Least of These

While millions of people in North America were consumed with the debut of the Dukes of Hazzard, the release of The Muppet Movie, the introduction of the McDonald’s Happy Meal, and things on a more significant scale such as the American hostage crisis in Iran, the search for the Unabomber, and the peace talks in Washington between Egypt’s Anwar Sadat and Israel’s Menachem Begin, a small group of Christians had been fasting and praying in Dallas. They were praying that the Lord would open the way for them to reach “the least of these” in ways that would improve their living conditions and demonstrate the love of Jesus to change their lives forever.

Who are “the least of these?” There is no simple definition and there are even theological debates on the subject. The Lord referred to them as the hungry, the thirsty, the poor, the sick, and the imprisoned. The answer boils down to this – God has always shown a special concern for the poor and needy, so it should come as no surprise that He expects us to do the same. This is not a matter for debate. It is an indicator of Christ-mindedness.

A native of South Asia, Dr. Yohannan has always been acutely aware of the presence and needs of those whom we could call “the least of the least,” “the poorest of the poor,” and those without access to the common necessities for healthy lives or to an awareness of the Gospel.

The vast majority of these people live in what has been called the 10/40 window. The 10/40 window encompasses the area between the 10^th to the 40^th parallels north of the equator and stretches across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. About two-thirds of the world’s total population lives within this ‘window’ that includes nearly all of South Asia.

Dr. Yohannan also understood that the leadership of the emerging nations, many of which had endured the commercialization associated with the colonialization of the British Empire, were wary of outsiders and their agendas. His ground-breaking book, Revolution in World Missions, pointed to the necessity and marked the beginning of reaching, training, and equipping local believers within their native countries who could reach their own people with the love of Jesus.

One of the ways that Gospel for Asia’s national workers serve “the least of these” is by providing care for women, the objects of culturally-based rejection and scorn in much of South Asia.

Serving Women Who Need Training and Assistance

Serving women who need literacy or vocational training - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Serving women who need literacy or vocational training minister to the least of these.

In 2017, Gospel for Asia (GFA) and its worldwide affiliates working in 18 Asian nations empowered more than 350,000 women through various ministry efforts.

In some areas where GFA-supported workers minister, women especially have it difficult. Some silently suffer violence at the hands of their husbands, their close and distant relatives and even strangers who exploit and abuse them.

In 2017, to make a positive difference, Gospel for Asia (GFA) helped provided free health care training to 289,033 women. This training focused on teaching women the basics of how to care for themselves and their families. They also learned how to keep a safe and hygienic home for their families and how to take care of themselves while pregnant. In addition, GFA taught 50,624 women in rural villages how to read and write, which will safeguard them from being cheated at the market and from entering into exploitative and usurious agreements with lenders. Another 10,965 women received vocational training that will provide them with valuable skills to make an honest living.

But more than this, as women experience the love of fellow human beings who are willing to serve and minister to them, their understanding of their worth and value in society is elevated. GFA-supported workers treat each girl and woman they meet with respect. They speak words of life into the hearts of women who’ve silently suffered violence, letting them know they matter, they have value and they are loved — even if the rest of society doesn’t think so.

As Dr. KP Yohannan noted, “It’s heartbreaking to consider the unthinkable struggles so many women go through, many of them unseen by anyone else in the world. We want them to know that they are precious in God’s sight, that they have unique value and worth as people created in His image, and that they are not forgotten.”

Providing Clean Drinking Water to Those Using Contaminated Sources

Another problem that plagues around two billion people worldwide – both women and men – is drinking water from stagnant ponds or water sources contaminated with feces. It is estimated that 502,000 deaths are caused each year by diseases, such as diarrhea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and polio, which are transmitted through contaminated water.

Providing clean water - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Providing clean water serves the least of these who are getting sick from contaminated water sources.

To meet the critical need for water in some of the neediest regions across Asia, GFA has spearheaded the “Jesus Well” project. In 2017 alone, Gospel for Asia was able to help provide 4,673 wells. That’s 4,673 sources of clean, fresh drinking water. One well typically provides clean water for at least 300 people and can last up to 20 years. GFA supporters around the world have allowed the rate of installation of Jesus Wells to continue and remain consistent, with tens of thousands of wells installed in the past several years. The Jesus Well project is one of the largest clean water initiatives in the world.

In regions where water might be accessible, but it’s just not safe to drink, GFA-supported workers provide BioSand water filters. These simple structures — locally built from concrete, sand, and rocks — filter water to remove 98 percent of biological impurities, providing safer water for drinking and cooking. In 2017, GFA helped provided 11,324 BioSand water filters for families and individuals.

As critical as these needs are, they are just a sampling of all that God has done through GFA in 2017. Around 234,300 families received much-needed income-generating gifts. GFA-supported workers organized 1,245 medical camps in villages and remote communities. They also helped install 6,364 toilets in communities desperately in need of safe sanitation facilities—and so much more.

“These statistics serve as an aerial view of what God accomplished in one year throughout communities in Asia,” Dr. Yohannan said. “God has done so much through His servants, who are faithfully ministering to the poor, desperate and needy around them. We praise God for giving us the opportunity to join Him in his work, and we are deeply grateful for the love, prayers and sacrificial giving of our donors so others may experience the grace and mercy of Christ.”

To learn more about all that God accomplished in GFA, click here.

About Gospel for Asia

Gospel for Asia is a Christian organization deeply committed to seeing communities transformed through the love of Christ demonstrated in word and deed. GFA serves “the least of these” in Asia, often in places where no one else is serving, so they can experience the love of God for the first time.

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Condemnation, Shame, Rejection Common for 57 Million Widows in Asia Reports Gospel for Asia

Last updated on: October 27, 2019 at 1:47 pm By GFA Staff Writer

Wills Point, Texas – GFA (Gospel for Asia) – Discussing where violence against women occurs worldwide, including violence against widows.

Widows in Meru, Kenya, Africa who have lost their husbands - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Widows in Meru, Kenya, Africa who have lost their husbands and have only themselves as a group to look after each other.

If a woman happens to escape the abuse so common in marriage, what happens to her once she is no longer married and becomes a widow? Does the violence against widows end?

Violence Against Widows

“Gulika’s life drastically changed the day her husband died. … Bearing the title ‘widow’ was a heavy weight to carry. The sharp, condemning words of the villagers stung Gulika’s already broken heart. Because of this, the pain of losing her husband increased all the more. It seemed that every time she stepped out of her home she wasn’t safe from their harsh criticism.

“The villagers believed Gulika was cursed. They were even afraid that if she passed them on the street, she would bring them bad luck. This shame and rejection, on top of the reality of her husband’s death, grew unbearable. Soon Gulika fell into deep emotional despair.”

Condemnation. Shame. Rejection.

a widow has lost all “color” from her life once her husband has died - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Wearing a white sari symbolizes that a widow has lost all “color” from her life once her husband has died.

Gulika, like so many other widows in South Asia, incurred the blame for her husband’s death—even though he had died crossing railroad tracks as an oncoming train headed his way. But that didn’t matter. The cause of a husband’s death, no matter how arbitrary or natural, is blamed on the wife.

People believe the husband’s death came about because the wife is a curse, a bad omen. They may strip her of her jewelry, shave off her hair, and force her to wear a white-colored sari, signifying she no longer has any “color” and must spend the rest of her days on earth in mourning. Often, she’s cast out of the home, left with no property and no way to fend for herself. She no longer has any family unless she has dependent children. In order to survive, she may need to beg or turn her body over to prostitution.

There are more than 57 million widows in Asia—and it transcends ages and social statuses. A person can become a widow as young as 7 years old (depending on if they were forced into a child marriage) or can come from a wealthy, high-class family. But once a girl or a woman bears the name “widow,” who they were before no longer matters. They’re obligated to live out the rest of their lives forgotten, shamed and without any hope.

The cause of a husband’s death, no matter how arbitrary or natural, is blamed on the wife.

In an article published by National Geographic, journalist Cynthia Gorney was able to get an insider’s view on the plight of widows. In one interview, she noted the “fury” a social worker named Laxmi Gautam had when talking about the condition of widows:

“We asked whether Gautam had ever imagined what she would change if she were given the power to protect women from these kinds of indignities. As it turned out, she had. ‘I would remove the word ‘widow’ from the dictionary,’ she said. ‘As soon as a woman’s husband is gone, she gets this name. This word. And when it attaches, her life’s troubles start.’”

There are more than 57 million widows in Asia - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — There are more than 57 million widows in Asia

When Will the Violence Against Widows End?

From one stage of life to the next, it would seem the women of Asia hardly get any reprieve from abuse and discrimination. Violence against women is “from the womb to the tomb,” as the old saying goes.

But in the midst of such gloom, Gospel for Asia—and other governmental and non-governmental organizations working on behalf of women’s rights in Asia—is seeing a new dawn rising for hundreds of thousands of women.

As women experience the love of fellow human beings who are willing to serve and minister to them, their understanding of their worth and value in society is elevated. Gospel for Asia-supported workers, including men, treat each girl and woman they meet with respect. They speak words of life into the hearts of women who’ve silently suffered violence, letting them know they matter, they are important, they are valuable, they are loved—even if the rest of society doesn’t believe so.

Remember Aamaal, the woman who tied a noose and was planning on hanging herself to escape her husband’s abuse? She didn’t jump. She didn’t kill herself. Instead, a relative offered her hope in the name of Jesus and led her to a compassionate GFA-supported pastor. Because of that, her life changed—and her husband experienced renewal too! He no longer drinks. He no longer beats his wife, and Aamaal is no longer living the life of an abused woman.

Geeta and her two young children rebuilt their lives - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Geeta and her two young children rebuilt their lives after their abusive father left, through the support of their local church.

When Geeta’s abusive husband left her, she went from fear to despair—not relief. She faced pressure to sell her body as a prostitute, and she eventually started working as one. But one of her friends, a believer, knew there was a better way to live. She shared loving counsel with Geeta, something she had been searching for.

The hunger and poverty Geeta and her children faced remained a problem, however, until Geeta’s children were enrolled in a Gospel for Asia-supported Bridge of Hope center. The local church has also came alongside the family, helping them find a safer place to live and provided help and encouragement.

As GFA-supported workers lead their congregations to truly value women, whole portions of society are showing women respect they’ve never experienced before. Believers can be heard thanking God for their newborn baby girls. They educate their daughters to give them a future of their own. They refuse to receive dowry as a testimony to the love of Christ. And when their sisters in Christ become widows, they embrace and support them rather than reject them.

Gospel for Asia-supported Initiatives Helping to End Violence Against Widows, Women

Through various GFA-supported initiatives, girls and women have opportunities to reach heights they were once barred from reaching because of their gender.

Literacy Training

provides adult women with the opportunity to learn how to read and write—skills they never had the chance to learn, most likely because in the minds of many parents, a girl’s education is not worth investing in.

Health Care Seminars

teach women how to properly take care of their pregnancies, their babies, their homes and families, which empowers them inside the home.

Gospel for Asia’s Bridge of Hope Program

is a child sponsorship program that helps keep young girls off the streets and provides them with an education—while teaching every student how boys and girls are created equal in God’s sight.

Income-generating Gifts

give impoverished women the ability to take care of themselves and their families if their husbands are struggling to provide, unemployed, or incapacitated due to alcohol or other addictions. Vocational training makes it possible for women to learn skills that will help them find good jobs—or even start their own business!

At the heart of many of these initiatives are GFA-supported women missionaries and Sisters of Compassion, specialized women missionaries. They stand beside and advocate for the rights of abused and neglected women. They show others how to love and care for the people around them, regardless of their gender. Through them—and the guidance and teaching of male pastors and missionaries who see each woman as precious, valuable and made in the image of Almighty God—violence against women is ending. Women are enjoying new life safe from hands that once sought to abuse them.

Sisters of Compassion - KP Yohannan - Gospel for Asia — Sisters of Compassion help widows in need of support, encouragement or medical attention.

As for Geeta, she has a solid group of people who have stood with her through her hardships. We, too, can come alongside women like Geeta. Through our prayers and support of national workers, we take part in helping end the violence against women in Asia.

When we come alongside GFA-supported workers, we empower them to empower others. We have seen the fruit of these efforts over and over again, and by God’s grace, we will see more and more women set free—physically, emotionally and mentally—from the abuse and neglect they’ve known their entire lives.

For more on Patheos about violence against widows, their plight and need, go here.

This article originally appeared on gfa.org.

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Christ’s Love Motivates Us to Be a Bridge of Hope for 70,000 Children

Last updated on: November 5, 2019 at 10:30 am By GFA Staff Writer

Christ's love brings hope in the eyes of a child - KP Yohannan - Gospel or Asia — Hope in the eyes of a child due to Christ’s love in Bridge of Hope.

More than 67.4 million children worldwide are forced out of school due to poverty, depriving them of the education needed to succeed. Unable to read and write, most eventually find themselves unable to get good jobs and succumb to the cycle of poverty, which continues for another generation.

Rather than going to school and playing like more privileged children their age, an estimated 150 million children are engaged in child labor. These kids wander around begging, doing odd jobs and selling garbage so they can have a small amount of food to live another day or work.

In some parts of Asia, children from the poorest families are three times more likely to die by the age of 5 than those from higher income groups. This gap is due to starvation and disease take a striking toll on the marginalized, who lack access to basic medical care and proper nutrition.

In the early days of the developing ministry of Gospel for Asia, Dr. KP Yohannan had a dream—a clear vision in which the Lord showed him that something had to be done to provide hope for these poor children. Here, in his own words, is what happened.

It was while sleeping in the early hours of the morning that I had a dream. I was standing in front of a vast field, looking out upon multitudes of desperate and suffering people just ready to slip into eternity. They had clearly been waiting for hope, but received none. I stood there overwhelmed at the sheer number of people. They seemed to fill endless acres continuing as far as the eye could see.

Watching the pain and despair in their faces, I got this sudden understanding that I was looking out upon the helpless multitudes that Jesus spoke about in the Gospels, the times when He spoke of the weary and abused, like the Dalits of today. It was as though the Lord was telling me that we had the opportunity before us to touch these people’s lives and reach them with the love of Christ, brining them hope for this life and the life to come.

Overcome with excitement at such an opportunity and imagining these precious suffering people being able to find hope for the present time and for eternity, I ran toward the field. But as I drew nearer, I was stopped. I couldn’t go any farther. There was a wide, gaping river in between the desperate multitudes and myself, a river so deep and raging that I dared not step closer to try to cross. I had not seen it from where I stood before, but now I did.

My heart broke. I was only able to look at these needy and suffering people, unable to help them. I stood there weeping, feeling so helpless and full of despair.

All of a sudden there appeared before me a bridge reaching from one side of the vast river to the other. It was not a narrow bridge but was very broad and so huge.

As I watched, the bridge became completely filled with little children from all over Asia—poor, destitute Dalit children, like those I’d seen on the streets of Bombay, Calcutta, Dakar, Katmandu and other Asian cities.

I woke from my dream and realized that the Lord was speaking to me about something so significant: that if we follow His instruction, our care for these children in need will be a bridge for so many people to find hope and relief they have been looking for.

– from Revolution in World Missions

And so, Gospel for Asia’s Bridge of Hope Program was created. Each child in Bridge of Hope is funded by the compassionate and generous gifts from faithful followers of Jesus Christ’s love.

All Bridge of Hope children have daily access to qualified tutors in math, science, language and other subjects to help them excel in their studies. They are provided with all the school supplies they need to attend school and succeed, including school bags, notebooks, pens, pencils, erasers and uniforms. Rather than being condemned to a life of illiteracy, many Bridge of Hope children go on to attend colleges and universities. They are provided with nutritious food, clean drinking water and sanitation facilities.

In addition, once a year, a qualified medical professional performs a full checkup on each child to prevent and diagnose any malady. When possible, they are also provide necessary treatment, ranging from major heart surgeries to being given eyeglasses for those with poor vision. Each child also receives de-worming tablets, as parasites are a major problem in rural areas, and also vitamin A tablets to prevent blindness. They are also given instructions on proper dental hygiene, so they can happily show their beautiful smiles.

Yet, it’s Christ’s love that motivates this program. That love compels us to help these children, knowing that each once is precious in God’s sight.

Please pray for the ministry of GFA-supported Bridge of Hope.

Pray for the children, their families and the staff in each Bridge of Hope center.

Pray and ask the Lord how you might contribute to sponsor a Bridge of Hope child.

Pray with thanksgiving for what the Lord has done and is continuing to do through Bridge of Hope.

For more on Patheos about Bridge of Hope, click here.

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Women Hold Up Half the Sky

Last updated on: November 7, 2018 at 10:27 pm By Karen Mains

Wills Point, Texas – GFA (Gospel for Asia) – Women hold up half the sky, and other mother’s day topics from Karen Mains, Gospel for Asia blog contributor

The recent death of Barbara Bush—a consummate mother and grandmother—reminded me of learning plug-ins that can also dramatically shift the future trajectory of others. There have only been two women who have been both the wife of a President of the United States and a mother of a President of the United States. Abigail Adams was one; Barbara Bush was the other.

The news media has spent an amazing amount of time in tributes and testimonies of friends and political associates about this woman who died at age 92. In fact, I can’t remember another president’s wife (not even Jacqueline Kennedy) who, upon death, has received so many accolades. Most comment on her warmth and hospitality, her acerbic wit, her political instincts, the way she “called it as she saw it,” and the long love affair with her husband of 73 years, George H. W. Bush.

Some have dubbed Barbara Bush “America’s Matriarch.” When asked why she had gained America’s favor, she replied, “My mail tells me that a lot of fat, white-haired, wrinkled ladies are tickled pink. I mean, look at me—if I can be a success, so can they.” When the Bushes left the White House, she had an astonishing 86 percent approval rating.

The recent death of Barbara Bush…reminded me of learning plug-ins that can also dramatically shift the future trajectory of others.

What impresses me about Barbara Bush is the interest she had in illiteracy before she came to the White House, during her time as the president’s wife, and after he lost the election for a second term. This would be an example of a “plug-in” educational issue, learning not demanding formal schooling but absolutely essential for the future success of a growing child. One needs to know how to read.

Bush helped to pass the National Literacy Act, which focused on teaching millions of American adults to read, and she also founded the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy, which encouraged reading and writing in low-incomes households (for both child and parent). Partnering with local organization, more than $110 million has been made available for the purpose of expanding literacy programs across the country. According to ProLiteracy, just in the United States:

36 million adults cannot read or write above the third-grade level.
68 percent of literacy programs are struggling with long waiting lists, and less than 10 percent of adults in need are receiving service.
Children whose parents have low literacy levels have a 72 percent chance of being at the lowest reading levels themselves. These children are more likely to get poor grades, display behavioral problems, have high absentee rates, repeat school years, or drop out.
Low literacy costs the U.S. $225 billion or more each year in non-productivity in the work force, crime and loss of tax revenue due to unemployment.
43 percent of adults with the lowest literacy levels live in poverty.
75 percent of state prison inmates did not complete high school or can be classified as low literate.

One needs to know how to read. Using the local church again as a baseline because of its parish membership consisting predominately of people who are concerned about the good and about doing good, what if five volunteers from each church in a town or village or rural hamlet or big city would seek to take tutoring training for helping parents (and their kids) develop reading skills—what could happen? What if that team of five people found out what kind of waiting list existed in their communities and then began to recruit reading tutors from their social affiliations to reduce the list? What if . . .?

Ten years ago, David and I received a letter from a friend, an M.D., who with his wife, a nurse, returned home from Africa where they had been working in the HIV/AIDS epidemic to co-lead Medical Ambassadors International, a faith-based, world health organization. The letter read: “We are wondering if either Karen or David would be able to serve on the board of MAI. Particularly, we are wondering if Karen would be able to serve because our board of directors is all men, and we need to find capable women who are experienced and qualified to work along with them.”

Well, who could resist an invitation such as that? I gladly agreed to serve on the board of MAI. Every year, the International Council (IC), field leaders from all over the planet, of all nationalities, gather in the States to confer with one another, visit their supporting donors and attend an international health conference that has value to all. At the very first IC gathering I attended, preceded by a directors’ meeting, I chatted with the woman who had graciously opened her home to our group of about 35 people and was also, with a team of volunteers (some wives of the board members), providing our meals.

“Oh, I want to show you something,” she said and pulled her laptop computer to a clear spot in her very crowded dining room. It was a home video of a teaching in another country involving local women.

“This is the Women’s Cycle of Life teaching unit,” she explained.

I knew some things about MAI, but my learning curve was to be long and arduous in the days ahead. I knew that Medical Ambassadors had moved from the clinic-treatment model to a preventive-health care model that prevented some 80 percent of the diseases before they became clinical. I had even taken a week-long training of trainers session that exposed me to the non-lecture teaching methodology that had been developed, field tested across the world, enculturated and, at this time, was present for the taking-down off the web free to all—some thousands of lessons. I also knew that the teaching model was based on a participatory model, not a lecture model, incorporated dramatic enactments by the students, was designed using orality principles because many of those being trained were either illiterate or semi-illiterate.

Using a system of questions, the trainees discovered answers to the health lessons for themselves. This process gave them a heightened sense of ownership. Charlene, the designer of the Women’s Cycle of Life (WCL), had been a former public health nurse and had adapted many of those lessons she taught in her California job to the Medical Ambassadors teaching formula, called CHE (Community Heath Education). In essence, WCL was everything a woman needed to know about her own body, her own health, her own reproductive system from the womb to the tomb.

“How much is this being used internationally?” I wondered and gathered from her response that the answer was, “Not much.” My next question was: “What does this need to go international?” We talked about it a little and decided that a WCL international director funded full-time would give the program the boost it needed, at least as a start. At the next board meeting, I spoke to my new friends around the table, who indeed, were all men, all well-meaning, intelligent and good hearted.

Women hold up half the sky according to the Chinese proverb.

“Do you know what we are sitting on? I mean, after all, women hold up half the sky according to the Chinese proverb.”

It didn’t take much advocacy, and in an amazingly short time, a director was hired: a nurse who had a Ph.D. in community health. She launched the WCL training of trainers and started pushing the Women’s Cycle of Life program outside its U.S. confinements.

I had nothing to do with developing this program, knew nothing about the program, but was in the right place at the right time to become an advocate for the program. Women’s Cycle of Life has gone worldwide. Men from many countries watching their wives learning from WCL have requested something similar: a men’s cycle of life.

I’m proud of the gentlemen sitting at that Board of Directors table who so quickly responded to my prodding. Being an advocate for the Women’s Cycle of Life program is one of the best things I’ve done in my whole life.

Being an advocate for the Women’s Cycle of Life program is one of the best things I’ve done in my whole life. As WCL was launching, the field director in Ethiopia, a woman—whom I told rides her motorcycle through traffic in Addis Ababa—along with the wife of the executive director of MAI trialed a program for women. In two sessions, some 42 women were invited for a week-long WCL training. For many, this was the first time they had left their homes, had someone else cook their meals or stayed in a dormitory setting with other women. They gobbled up the training, and because they were Christians, they were impacted by the Scripture integrated into each unit of teaching—childbirth, for instance, conception, hygiene, etc. After four months, oral interviews were conducted (many on camera) with those who had received the WCL training. Those 42 women had taught a cumulative total of some 1,600 lessons to other women.

Now, if I were going to radically transform Mother’s Day (which realistically, I know I probably won’t be able to do), I would ask some well-meaning families who love their moms to reconsider taking some of that $23.6 billion retailer’s spend on Mother’s Day and use it in a way that really, really, really makes a difference for other remarkable mothers, or remarkable mothers-to-be, or the mothers who want to be remarkable all around the world.

I’d encourage a look into literacy training in an interested party’s home town.

I’d check out Nicholas Kristoff and Cheryl Wu Dunn’s book, A Path Appears, which in 315 pages gives examples of ordinary people doing extraordinary things in the States and across the world. Pages 316-317 list “Six Steps You Can Take in the Next Six Minutes”, one of which is “Consider supporting an early childhood program. That might mean giving to Reach out and Read, which for $20 can take on a new child and introduce him or her to the joys of reading.” Then, this husband and wife writing team provide comprehensive lists of organizations they trust as suggestions for further involvement (other than just Mother’s Day).

You know, there are other possibilities we might explore as a family this Mother’s Day.

Or a woman might say to herself, You know, there are other possibilities we might explore as a family this Mother’s Day.

Go to the Gospel for Asia website, www.gfa.org and order a free copy of the book No Longer a Slumdog, which tells the incredible story of India’s neglected and forgotten slum children. Reading this book is a means of educating yourself as far as the incredible difficulties of slum children in India and the possibilities that exist to sponsor one of these desperate children who have little hope and a very bleak future without intervention through education in a Bridge of Hope center.

I will never forget the day, visiting in Calcutta, walking down the busy streets and seeing a boy, about eleven years of age, sleeping alone on the hard, concrete sidewalk. I promise you that this book, written by Dr. KP Yohannan, will give you a heart of passion for the “slumdogs” of the world.

Then map out a Mother’s Day plan. Figure out how you or your friends or your women’s group or your mother and your daughter who is also a mother can transform this day so that it is really special.

Let me know what you do.

Let me know what you think.

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Read my prior two blogs on this topic: Part 1 | Part 2