Across the world, religion and gender equality are still too often framed as opposites – as if faith is inherently limiting for women, and as if emancipation can only happen outside religious communities. Yet it is precisely within churches, mosques and other faith communities that ideas about women’s roles are shaped and passed on.

What if change begins there? What if women, from within their own faith traditions, show that faith and equality are not mutually exclusive? In several countries, religious women are working for peace, safety and justice – not in spite of their faith, but inspired by it. Their leadership makes clear that equality is not an abstract ideal. It is a condition for sustainable peace.

Northern Uganda: healing what war has left behind

In northern Uganda, the war may officially be over, but its impact continues to shape family life. Sister Mary Specioza understands how deeply pain can mark a person’s life. In a region scarred by conflict and poverty, it is often women and girls who carry the consequences behind closed doors, in silence. They are expected to endure. To remain quiet. So was Specioza. “My father did not want me,” she says. And he made that clear in many ways. Because she knows what it feels like to be unseen and unheard, she recognises the pain carried by other women.

After receiving training in counselling, mediation and restorative justice, she now supports families caught in ongoing conflict. She helps couples listen without judgement and find a way back into conversation. Trauma here is not unusual; it is woven into daily life. That a young woman takes on a leading role in peacebuilding is far from self-evident. Yet Sister Specioza shows that when women are given space to mediate, something shifts. People listen differently – less from a position of power, more with a focus on restoration. In doing so, she helps prevent violence from being passed on to the next generation. 

Nigeria: not only protection, but participation

In Nigeria, religious tensions and violence are part of daily reality. Sister Veronica Ifeyinwa Onyeanisi sees clearly who suffers most: women and children. During a visit to a displacement camp in Benue, she heard women speak about “horse riding” – their term for rape. It happened at night. There was no lighting in the camp. So Sister Veronica arranged for solar lamps to be installed. It may seem simple. But for women, it meant less fear. Greater safety. More freedom of movement.

“Women and children suffer most in conflict, but their voices are rarely heard,” she says. And that is the heart of the issue. In many conflict settings, women are treated as victims rather than leaders. They are protected, but not included. Sister Veronica takes a different approach. Through the Women’s Interfaith Council, she brings together women from Christian and Muslim communities and involves them in conversations about safety, education and economic independence. As long as women are protected but not invited to participate in decision-making, inequality persists. And without equality, peace remains fragile.

Bolivia: kicking down closed doors

In Bolivia, every three days a woman is killed simply because she is a woman. Violence against women is deeply intertwined with cultural and religious beliefs about obedience and submission. Pamela grew up in that reality. As a child, she would hear her father yell at her mother. She’d see him hit her. 

Years later, while studying theology, she encountered the same beliefs within the church. Her church refused to support her further studies “because women are meant to marry.” Her ordination was resisted for years on the grounds that a female pastor would be “unbiblical.” Time and again, she faced closed doors and deeply conservative rules. Yet she refused to step back. She knew that if she gave up, nothing would change. 

Through persistence, Pamela became one of the first female pastors in the Lutheran Church in Bolivia. She works daily to challenge inequality between men and women. Bringing women and men together, she opens conversations about violence, power dynamics and the biblical interpretations often used to keep women silent. Through workshops and community dialogues, she helps people reimagine faith and relationships – not through submission, but through mutual dignity. In doing so, she is reshaping the beliefs that sustain violence and building greater equality from within. 

Kenya: security is not only men’s work

In Nyali, a district in Mombasa, luxury villas and informal settlements lie just a few hundred metres apart. Behind the tourist image lies another reality: drugs, gangs and young people being drawn into criminal networks. Mama Shamsa Abubakar Fadhil serves as District Peace Chair – the first woman to hold this role in her region. Security has traditionally been regarded as a man’s domain.

Mama Shamsa challenges that assumption. She supports young people at risk of sliding into crime or extremism, helping them rebuild a sense of direction – through dialogue, mentorship and opportunities for work or small-scale enterprise. In doing so, she prevents frustration from escalating into violence. The fact that a woman occupies this position reshapes how security is understood. Not as control or force, but as trust and long-term opportunity. Her leadership demonstrates that gender equality is not only about equal rights on paper, but about who is entrusted to shape peace and security in practice. 

Indonesia: restoring dignity

In eastern Indonesia, Sister Fransiska Imakulata supports women and girls who have survived domestic violence, sexual abuse or human trafficking. Some were deceived by promises of work. Others were exploited by people they trusted. Together with her team, she stands beside them at their most vulnerable moments: when filing a police report, during investigations, in court. She provides safe accommodation, professional counselling and practical training so that women not only recover, but can build an independent future. 

At the same time, her organisation presses local and national authorities to enforce laws against trafficking and sexual violence. What she disrupts is more than individual cases of abuse. She challenges a system in which women remain dependent and perpetrators go unpunished. By strengthening women both legally and economically, she helps rebalance power. Here, something essential takes shape: women who no longer remain silent. Women who understand that their rights matter — and that they are entitled to claim them. 

Why this matters

What these women share is not only courage. They are religious women working from within their own communities. They understand the culture. They speak the language of faith. And they use that position to make change possible. 

Religion is often portrayed globally as a source of division or as a justification for inequality between men and women. And yes, within religious traditions, harmful beliefs about women’s roles do exist. That is precisely why their leadership is so significant. They show that faith can be lived differently. That religious authority is not exclusively male. That sacred texts are not meant to silence women, but to uphold justice. . 

International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day reminds us that equality is never automatic. Not in politics. Not in the workplace. And not within religious structures. The stories of Sister Specioza, Sister Veronica, Mama Shamsa and Sister Ika show that faith and gender equality are not at odds. On the contrary. When religious women are given space to lead, power dynamics begin to shift. Families find stability. Young people are heard. Communities become safer. Peace grows stronger. 

We work alongside these women over the long term, supporting them as they create space for others within their own communities. These local religious leaders demonstrate that change begins from within. 

Would you like to contribute to a world in which women are recognised as leaders and peacebuilders? Stand with them.