"We don't want our daughters to be hostages of wealth."  Madam Achol Majok Kur pronounces the words slowly and expressively. She emphasizes her aversion of widespread cultural attitudes and practices that lead to forced marriages and gender-based violence. 

"Because of the high dowry, I'd be given to the man that I don't like. If a man offers 200 cows, and the man I love has 50 heads of cattle, I will be forced by my parents to go to the one with 200 cattle, because that is what they want.  I am counted by them in terms of wealth."

Achol chairs the Women's Desk of the South Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SSPEC), a new denomination and offshoot from its Sudanese namesake in the North.  Along with other Christians from African descent, however, their opportunity to thrive as a minority religious group in a predominantly Arab Muslim context had become increasingly restricted.  When South Sudan gained autonomy from Sudan in 2011, many of these Presbyterians decided to return to their ancestral land, with a fervent desire to help rebuild society in a new nation, where the church would have the latitude to effectively engage in that transformative process.

"If you have a girl, your future is secured. Even if you don't have cattle this year, you know that in 10 years' time you will, because you have this girl. So this girl is considered as an asset."  Traditionally parents in South Sudan marry off their daughters at a very young age as child brides to often much older men.  Achol explains that in most cases these forced marriages result in unhealthy, loveless relationships in which women are considered the rightful property of their husbands. They end up suffering emotional and physical abuse from the hands of their spouses while feeling abandoned by their parents.

Achol continues:  "This is an issue we need to take on as SSPEC women. First it needs to be addressed at the family level. If situations like that are happening around us, we have to reach out as a church and as members of the local community. Changing human beings is a process. We need to bring people to understand that education is the key. The girl will then start making decisions for herself. There is no need for anyone to decide on her behalf.  Feeling empowered by her education, she will not let herself be forced again, but [she will] carry on making her own decisions. Instead of being married off in fifth grade or so, she can insist on going to secondary school, reasoning that later on she will be a mother who knows how to take care of her child. She would even know how to give her child medicines and be able to read the vaccination card. This is why education is the key, and girls have to make that choice for themselves."

For more information about supporting Christi Boyd or other mission co-workers serving in PC(USA) World Mission, please contact Bruce Whearty at 1-800-728-7228, ext. 5157, or  bruce.whearty@pcusa.org.  Thank you.