The Complex Issues...

(Note from Jen Erickson who posts these blogs for Tom and Teresa)

I enjoy receiving emails from Teresa. She sends me a few emails with the blog posts or newsletters attached and asks me to send them or to post them here on this site. I always enjoy getting to read these snippets into Tom and Teresa's life in Ethiopia and even though I know their life isn't a bed of roses every day, it is still good for me to read some frustrations/realities of the "way of life" in Ethiopia.

Below are some three issues that perplex Teresa (and myself). These are complex issues. Issues that we can't begin to comprehend or understand. However, I believe that to admit that life isn't always easy in Ethiopia is healthy. It's honest. It's real. 

So, here it is - the complex issues from Teresa...

Stories of Ethiopian life I have learned:

About the role of women; they bear the burden of life in Africa. Men as a whole do very little of the labor.
Women are more or less thought of as slaves or property. The spend hours each day gathering firewood for
cooking. They haul water for the family most of the time walking several miles each way. They do all the
cooking and cleaning. Many of them also have other jobs doing hard, manual labor-hauling rocks, cement,
and working in the fields on crops. In most societies, the woman is bargained for in marriage-which is
arranged by her father. Most of the time, love has little or nothing to do with the arranged marriage. The dowry is the name of the game-not love. In some tribes, girls will bring a bride price of maybe 30 cattle. They (the women) are valued for the work they will do for the husband. The cattle are the banking system in Africa.
Whenever someone gets sick and needs medicine or needs money to purchase seeds or tools- or even so that a son may marry-the cows are ʻcashed inʼ and sold. The common people usually donʼt have savings accounts in banks-only the very rich have money in a bank. In Mursi culture-the women are prized and boys are the liability because in order for them to marry the family has to come up with 60-80 cattle to pay the dowry. Women that are highly valued for their strength, ability to work and keep house, and to bear children
etc..can bring as much as 100 cattle!

Polygamy has been a very hot topic amongst the church. In African culture, it has always been ok for a man
to have more than one wife. It was a status thing-kind of like he is wealthy enough to support two or more
wives and families. However, it is really a business consideration as well. The more women and children a
man has, the more workforce he has- which means less work for the man to do now.
It is difficult trying to rein in my feelings of anger towards this attitude so prevalent not only in this country but
in many others around the world. Growing up in America, I took equality of the sexes as the norm. I never
realized the extent of the exploitation of women and children in other parts of the world. But now I have seen
it firsthand. The problem from a church point of view is: what happens when these former pagans become
believers in Christ? What happens to the multiple wives? Since the Bible and Jesus taught so clearly about
there being only one wife for one man-what were they to do about this issue?
The early indigenous church ( from the 1960-70ʻs ) had some misguided teaching from a former leader of SIM and they were taught that a man with two wives must ʻput awayʼ his second wife and only live with one
woman from now on before he could be baptised as a believer. But that was cruel to the second wife (and
children) who depended on the man for his protection and status in society. If they were put away, they
became outcasts and worse than dead in their community. Some leaders in the church now believe that the
best way to handle that problem is this: for first generation believers, allow them to keep both wives and let them be baptized. They did not know any better while living their former pagan lives. But the second and
succeeding generations are now only allowed one wife-after all, they know better now having been raised and
taught by their now-believing parents.

This seems to be the most humane way to me....
Female circumcision. Wow. What an awful thing. Satan has really deceived these people into believing this
evil practice. The idea behind it is so that a woman will not feel any pleasure during sex. Therefore, the belief
is that she will then not be promiscuous or unfaithful. Also, the same idea for young women/girls during puberty. They are circumcised so that they will not be promiscuous and have sex before marriage. However,
many young girls when they know this is coming, will go ahead and have sex while they can before they are
mutilated. Of course, this spreads HIV throughout the society even more. It is a sad and sick practice
that people are deceived into believing. But now, some women are starting to speak out against this. Some
mothers are refusing to give their daughters over to the mutilation knife. But many are still afraid of the
condemnation by their societies. If a woman is not circumcised, she is taunted and made fun of-ostrasized by
her tribe, because she ʻlooks differentʼ, etc...Female mutilation is also why there are so many women who die
in childbirth. Scar tissue grows over the vagina from the mutilation. Then during labor, since the vagina is not
elastic and pliant anymore (due to scar tissue) the women often die in childbirth or develop fistulas that
separate them forever from society. Ethiopia has one of the highest rates of fistulas in the world. Female
circumcision is a big reason for these fistulas. Fistulas are formed when the rectum tears during childbirth. The woman is no longer able to control her bowels and often is shunned and forced to live by herself-apart from her community. She becomes an outcast and is looked down on. And none of this was ever her fault. She was simply the victim of ignorance and evil.


I can understand Teresa's frustration and anger toward these issues. Please pray for a healing over the people. That they will have their eyes opened to the lies that they have been taught. I also ask that we pray for Tom and Teresa that the Lord will give them a never ending love and compassion for these people. That our Heavenly Father will supply them with peace that transcends all understanding when they face these issues.

Thank you for continuing to lift them up in prayer. Please send them encouraging note to ttrieder@gmail.com