Anti-Misogyny Day

Yesterday at church the focus of the second Sunday of Advent was the campaign to end domestic violence called Orange the World. The gospel passage was the encounter between Elizabeth and the angel, the divine silencing of Zechariah, then the meeting between Elizabeth and her relative Mary. There was an excellent skit involving several women and girls which cleverly told this story and Rev. Isaac interwove the theme through the service. 

Today is the The National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women which came about because of the massacre of fourteen unsuspecting young women at Polytechnique Montréal on this date, December 6, 1989. The perpetrator was a misogynistic coward who blamed women for his own failures, a grim reality so often with domestic violence. While that event was staggering in its scope we're told that 58 women have died by femicide in Ontario during the past twelve months -- more than four times the number who died in Montreal that terrible day 32 years ago. Numbers were up across the country and some experts suggest that the confinement of the pandemic may be a contributing factor. 

In December of 1989 I was a minister in Sudbury, Ontario, in my mid-thirties, a husband and father to three young children, two of whom were girls. I participated in a solemn vigil organized by one of my colleagues in ministry, a woman. 

Through the years I have been aware of the grimly matter-of-fact reporting about acts of femicide and extreme violence against women. I also think of wife Ruth's work for a women's shelter, the bullet-proof glass and security systems to secure the building where she worked, and the coordination with police to spirit women out of domestic situations where any intimation that a woman and her children were planning to leave would have been dangerous. There were times when I was concerned about Ruth's safety in her role, including when she went to court with clients who were facing their abusers. 

Perhaps we should call this Anti-Misogyny Day, knowing that what must be addressed in our society are all the systems which subjugate women and continue to empower men who perpetrate emotional as well as physical violence. While physical violence is a threat, so often abuse occurs without one partner even touching another, with control and denigration happening in other ways. 

We can pray and learn and act as people of faith, even though we may prefer "out of sight, out of mind." And we must remember that misogyny often flourishes under the guise of "God's plan."