Churches urged to play ball in GBV

CHURCHES have been called upon to mainstream Gender-Based Violence in their activities as part of efforts to address the scourge following concerns that some perpetrators were hiding behind religion.

Participants who were speaking during a Gender-Based Violence awareness campaign carried out by Hwange Local Board on Tuesday said GBV was rife in churches which saw leaders spiritualising it instead of taking stern measures to address it.

“We are tired of pastors and churches that spiritualise every problem and this has given rise to perpetrators hiding behind religion. We have seen women approaching pastors seeking to be assisted but they are told to ‘pray about it as it is a result of evil spirits’ and the violence continues unabated,” said a woman who identified herself as MaDube.

Another resident said the church had become a hiding place for perpetrators as the abuse would be swept under the carpet on the excuse that reporting it would spoil the church’s image.

“There are instances where cases reported to the church are quickly swept under the carpet with the victim being warned that reporting to the police would affect the church. This has resulted in a number of women suffering in silence because the perpetrator is an elder or close to the church leader. We have to acknowledge as churches that this is worsening the plight of women who make up most of the congregation. The church should get involved in addressing GBV, not hiding it,” said the resident.

Responding to public queries on how the church was dealing with GBV, Lutheran Church’s Reverend Kumbirai Munemo who was part of the panellists acknowledged the existence of unreported cases of domestic violence in the church arguing that there was a need for the churches to shift from spiritualising all matters to dealing with the problem head on.

“GBV has no class, it can happen to anyone even in the church among leaders or congregants. Most cases go unreported as a result of various reasons and the church is not left out. Yes, there are tendencies by our fellow brothers and sisters to brush aside GBV where the ‘let’s pray about it’ mentality takes charge leaving the problem unresolved. What we are now doing as churches is that we are introducing policies that deal with such. We are constantly talking and creating awareness on GBV in our meetings. We have noted that there is a need to help in dealing with the problem as we are not immune to such things,” said Rev Munemo.

Pastor Sibanda of Family Covenant Church concurred with his counterpart arguing that the Christian Bible does not condone violence against fellow human beings.

“As a church we use the manuscript of life that is the Bible that God gave us to deal with life issues and GBV is not an exception. What we are now doing as churches is to create awareness on GBV and mechanisms on how to deal with it.”

A chaplain at a local prison weighed in saying reporting violence to the police is the way to go instead of relegating it to prayer alone.