Factores de influencia en el clima

With the number of researches on gender equality now available, and with the ever increasing number of women who excel in their places of work, the question should no longer be whether women are equal to men. Gender equality is indisputable. The question should rather be what is being done to make people, men and women, recognize the fact and importance of gender equality. The first major step in the society was taken by the United Nations General Assembly on 10^th December, 1948, when it adopted what is known today as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Thanks to the Fourth World Conference of Women in Beijing (China) in 1995, which assessed the progress of gender equality so far, more women are now waking up gradually to the demands of all the declarations in favours of women's rights.

The Church has also been awake by championing the campaign for gender equality. She is bidding farewell to her past; a past full of ungodly discrimination against women. Earlier on, the Church was in the forefront of the patriarchal project to discredit women. She interpreted history and the Bible solely from the point of view of men-centered ideology. In the attempt to come to terms debased and bedeviled women in the name of God, denied them the right to claim that they are also created in the image of God, and burnt them on the stake.

The Church's first step to reinstate women began with the Second Vatican Council, which in its closing message, addressed women as follows: "The hour is coming, in fact has come, when the vocation of women is being acknowledged in its fullness, the hour in which women acquire the world an influence, an effect and a power never hitherto achieved." (8 December 1965, AAA 58, 1996, 13-14). This message re-echoed what was already mentioned in two documents of the Second Vatican Council: Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modem World (Gaudium et Spes, 8,9,60) and Decree on the Apostolate of the Laity (ApostolicamActuositem, 9). So women, as they rightly read the signs of times. Pope plus XII in his many addresses to women. Pope John XXIII in his Encyclical Pacerm in Terris and Pope Paul VI in his discourses. The 1971 and 1987 General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops both encouraged, among other things, the recognition of the dignity of women.

We cannot deny the fact that many a time these Papal and Episcopal declarations remain theoretical: the oppression of women In the church continued. But the

Ponificate of Pope John Paul II seems to have made a difference: he showed more commitment to the cause of women. He spoke at length about the welfare of women in his Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio (Christian Family in the Modern World, 1981) and in Mulieris Dignitatem (Dgnity And Vocation of Women, 1988).

Over and above these publications and other letters, Pope John Paul II initiated two concrete steps that approach to gender equality in our time.

First, he took pains to reinterpret those biblical passages that are often being used to advance the subjugation of women, such as Gen. 2: 18-25. He reestablished the fact that the Genesis creation account should be reinterpreted to illuminate the divine image in women. He also subtly corrects St Paul's teaching on women subordination in his letter to the Ephesians 5:21-33, which states that wives should be subject to their husbands in 'a very patriarchal way. Making reference to Eph. 5:21, John Paul II argues that all the rest of the points made on women subjection of man and woman to one another out of reverence for Christ. His view endorses what many scholars have been saying about the need to reinterpret the bible, isolation the socio cultural context in which the authors lived in, in order to shift the patriarchal colorations that blur the sharpness of divine revelation contained therein.

Secondly, in his Letter to Women on the event of the fourth World Conference of Women in Beijing China, published in 1995, Pope John Paul asked women pardon, for all that the Church has done to them to rob them of their dignity; and he went further to instruct that provision should be made to allow women participate in decision-making processes, especially in matters which concern women. With his decisive action, Pope John Paul II was calling on all Christian's men and women to do something concrete to redress the ills done to women and to translate gender equality into actions of justice and fair play. It should be clear that gender inequality is not

supported by human biology (nature) or by the creator. Nature made male and female to be complimentary and interdependent beings of the one human species, such that each is indispensable for the survival of humanity. In terms of importance and indispensability, therefore, all genders are equal; but they may differ in terms of functions. Also in terms of common origin, God created male and female, each to mirror his (God's) image in creation, according to the priestly account of the origin of creation. Jesus Christ himself defended gender equality and reminded people (Mat.

19: 3-10; Gen. 1:27). In the beginning was gender -equality, but inequality was introduced along the line due to the patriarchal quest for power and privileges, and sustained by erroneous interpretations and false ideologies.

Furthermore, other ways the church can fight against these practices is through preaching against it in their sermon. It will help conscientize the people on the evil effects of harmful traditional practices against women in our contemporary society.

The church can also so ahead to take the bull by the horn in order to ensure that these practices are stopped.

The church can also fight against these practices by organizing seminars/workshop in a public places where a good number of people can be seen in their numbers. It can only be in the market place or village square. The most important thing is that such workshop must attract crowd which is the target of the church.