The experience of being a woman in the churches of La Paz and El Alto A critical analysis of the ethos of religious patriarchy Itxaso Arias Arana Martín-Baró (1998) makes a difference between religion as "social institution" and religion as "personal experience" to which he calls religiosity, understanding by it "the various concrete forms like the groups and people who live the religion (...) composed by three basic elements: representations, practices and relationships." These are, according to the author, as a "letter of navigation in the daily and a record on the imaginary of gender" (quoted in Molina, 2015, p. 19). For example: [...] the altar of a church is the central place for exercising religious leadership, whoever uses it, legitimizes the representations of power – of the word of God - as a sacred law and it will deliver patterns of relational conduct between the genders that naturalize the masculine with the unquestionable divine and feminine as questionable earthly (Molina, 2015, p. 19). In this research we present, carried out between August and December of 2017, we have focused precisely on the analysis of representations, practices and relations within the framework of the churches of La Paz and El Alto, that is, we have tried to understand how personal experience of women in the framework of their churches, or in other words, we have tried to understand how they live their religious faith from the experience of being a woman within the framework of the religious patriarchate. As we will see, this seemed to us to be an adequate way of conducting an analysis of violence against women within the framework of churches, since it is precisely the religious patriarchate that supports and justifies certain beliefs and practices that are directly related to this problem. For all this, our aim was to "make a collective reflection of the ethos of religious patriarchy as a livelihood of violence against women, with females belonging to different churches, to encourage the construction of a collective will addressed to the fight against this problem." The theoretical support of the research Without a doubt, the proposal to think religious faith from the experience and subjectivity of women is the one we owe to feminist theology: 1 Feminist theology is presented as a radical search for the dignity and place of women, as well as the role to be played and the rights to be exercised in the church. It reacts against a theology that qualifies as patriarchal, androcentric and unilateral (Halkes, 1980, pp. 122-137). Of the various trends that exist within feminist theology, the one we are interested in, in the context of this research, is the one appealing for a new hermeneutic: It postulates that through the renewal of the Biblical sciences feminist theology can discover elements of the biblical message so far not taken into account or ignored. This position is as reformist and among its representatives we can appoint Phyllis Trible, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Letty Russell (Vélez, 2001, p. 548). Feminist hermeneutic establishes biblical interpretation as a method of feminist political reading. The method it proposes is to deconstruct the patriarchal nucleus of the biblical traditions and to elaborate the alternative political discourse of the ekklesia in the bosom of the biblical religions. Biblical interpretation must have a new concept in rhetorical terms (Vélez, 2001, p. 5). Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza bases on the experience of oppression of women as the centre and rule to evaluate both the theology of liberation and tradition and even the Bible itself. In this sense, feminist hermeneutics criticizes the biblical authority of the texts and analyses how the Bible is used as a weapon against women in their struggles for liberation. Only the traditions of the Bible and biblical interpretation that are not sexist or androcentric have the theological authority of revelation, if the Bible should not continue to be a tool for the oppression of women. The commitment of feminist theologians should not be with the Bible as a whole, but with the liberating Word of God articulated in biblical writings. (Vélez, 2001, p. 6) We say that we are in this approach because the critical analysis method of the ethos of religious patriarchy - as sustenance of violence against women - that we have designed and worked with the women involved in this research begins and is based, precisely, on the study of biblical texts from their experience and from their subjectivity. This is a fundamental element, since the interpretation of the biblical texts is carried out mostly by men, whether they are priests or shepherds, and these interpretations, in many cases, have a clear purpose: 2 [...] they should have a good preparation within the church, because they handle the Bible and most women believe in what the Bible says, I even have said at some point: "In the Bible it says." Then, as the churches are managed by men, they should have a good preparation according to reality and not at their convenience [...]; they want to keep the power. (Sister of the Ecumenical group, La Paz, September 6th) The ethos of religious patriarchy The ethos "[...] does not emerge from reflection, from the thought that interprets the experience, but solidifies in the works and in the activity of men" (Lledó, 1994, p. 23). It is that network that is building among the individuals that make up a community; they are, therefore, forms of coexistence that the works and behaviours themselves have been drawing, and "these works will be called ethos, that is, the result of works sanctioned 1 by a certain value, a certain utility to facilitate coexistence" (Lledó, 1994, p. 24). We are talking about shared practices that make up a "way of life"; therefore, we also talk about rules of behaviour and moral principles. In the case of this research, we focus on the need to review and collectively reflect on a specific ethos, that is, a way of life, called religious patriarchate, with the idea of finding, precisely, ways of more harmonious and egalitarian coexistence. Logically, the revision of this way of life or ethos is not going to be complete, but biased according to the objectives of this research. We know that religious patriarchy is a very broad field, but what we are interested in now is to analyse – from the experience of women participating - these practices and beliefs that support violence against women. We are not saying that this way of life does not have other elements, but these practices and beliefs of the religious patriarchate are crossed by power relationships that mark the inequality between men and women. And, in addition, as Alvarez (2001, p. 165) says, "Violence against women is the universal instrument of patriarchy to support male privileges." According to Gerda Lerner (1986), patriarchy is: "[...] the manifestation and institutionalization of male dominance on women and children of the family and the extension of that dominance over women to society in general." 1 The author uses “sanctioned” in the sense of confirmed or ratified. 3 Religious patriarchate is characterized by incorporating belief systems that preach androcentric messages, transmitting gender stereotypes based on man's superiority over women. There is, therefore, a need to analyse religions from a gender perspective in order to make visible how they contribute to maintain a structure of power"[...] and, above all, a concept of masculinity reproducing the paradigms of a hierarchical, authoritarian and violent divinity "(Tamayo and Salazar, 2016, p. 4). Violence against women in the context of religious patriarchy In this research – when working on violence against women and in our effort to do so in an integral way and, above all, to have a broader vision of the problem in the framework of the churches- we raise different perspectives or levels of analysis , as we not only study the violence framed in the church - specific types of violence within the framework of churches as institutions (physical, psychological and symbolic) -, but also want to analyse if the church justifies other types of violence ( violence against women whether physical, psychological or symbolic) and how it reacts to them, that is, whether or not it offers real support to women who suffer violence. That is, on the one hand we analyse types of specific violence, with their own characteristics, that are given in the framework of the churches and that, as we will see, provide another content to the types of violence defined in the law 348, and, on the other hand, we work on how it is justified or not and the response and reaction, within the framework of the churches, to the specific types of violence defined by that law. The definition of institutional violence established in law 348 says: Institutional violence: it is any action or omission by public servants or staff of private institutions, which implies discriminatory, prejudiced, humiliating and dehumanized action that retards, hinders, undermines or denies women access and attention to service required (law 348, art. 7). Who can exercise institutional violence? The Police, the Public Prosecutor's Office, the Judges and the magistrates of the courts, school authorities or any other agent of authority for actions or omissions that violate the rights and/or threaten the dignity and personal and family integrity. 4 As an institution, the Church has "agents of authority", most of them males (priests, pastors, bishops, etc.), who through the exercise of their power can become means of transmitting beliefs and practices that are part of the specific doctrine and that elevated to the category of norm are imposed and carry different types of violence against the woman. There is no doubt that women themselves also transmit this kind of belief. In this sense, we work on three types of violence: physical, psychological and symbolic. Physical violence: The woman does not own her own body. In the context of religions, and following Tamayo's approach (2011): -Women are not allowed to plan the family: they must have the sons and daughters that God wants, not the ones they freely decide. -They cannot exercise sexuality outside the limits imposed by religion (not to practise it before marriage and to exercise it within the framework of heterosexuality). The practice of sexuality outside of marriage or with persons of the same sex is expressly prohibited and condemned. -If they decide to interrupt the pregnancy they are accused of sinners and criminals, and it is requested even prison sentences for them. Religious leaders, for example Catholicism and Islam, coincide in the condemnation and criminalization of abortion. Psychological violence: We refer to systematic actions of devaluing, intimidating and controlling the behaviour and decisions of women. Specifically: -Consider them inferior by nature -Requiring submission to the husband -Not to value their testimony on equal terms -Not to recognize their authority (capacity of leadership) Symbolic Violence: 5 It is about the messages, symbols and impositions of the religious beliefs that transmit reproduce and consolidate relationships of domination, exclusion, inequality and discrimination, naturalizing the subordination of women. In this work we are fundamentally based on everything related to the imposition of private space as something typical for women. Under the argument of a divine and superior order, stereotypes and gender roles are transmitted based on the superiority of man over women, typical of a patriarchal culture, which have led to discriminatory treatment of women, giving a very marked role as wives, mothers and housewives. Gender stereotypes (also called sexual stereotypes) "refer to the personal characteristics of women as a group and men as well as a group" (Ovejero Bernal, 1998, 254). That is, it is a generalization that we make about a person by the fact of being a man or a woman. In addition, Williams and Best (1990a) make a distinction between "gender role stereotypes " and " gender trait stereotypes": "Roles are those that include beliefs regarding the overall adequacy of roles and activities for men and women. Traits are those stereotypes composed of psychological characteristics or traits of behaviour that are attributed with relatively frequency to men and women "(Ovejero Bernal, 1998, p. 254) As it is well known, gender stereotypes are the basis for inequality between men and women, opening the door to discrimination against women. In addition, the social construction of gender identity is a very important research focus in the context of violence against women: In violent relationships there is evidence of a rigid and perverse outlining of gender roles, defined as prescriptions concerning the ideal conditions for achieving the status of a man or a woman. Characteristics such as strength, power and dominance appear as eigenvalues of the male image, and as a counterpart, the female figure is elaborated with the attributes of weakness, controllability and need for protection, values that are transmitted as desirable behaviour patterns and are inserted into the identity of the developing subject, moving from an external control of behaviours to an internal control that replicates the gender ideology (Unger & Crawford, 1996). The relationship between gender violence and gender-based social constructions is an element of basic analysis, since: Ultimately, the historical survival of gender-based violence would be largely determined by the influence of social constructions that are notoriously differentiated by gender, which 6 shape attitudes, values and patterns of behaviour inserted into an asymmetric relationship between man and woman, which tends to perpetuate in the generations, influencing the presence of abusive and violent relationships within the relational dynamics of couples (Patró and Limiñana, 2005, quoted in Delgado, Sánchez and Dávila, 2011, p . 771) Therefore, gender stereotypes transmitted from the religions and as well as gender roles based on the superiority of men over women, which is typical of a patriarchal culture, is a type of symbolic violence that perpetuates other types of violence against women, such as the physical and psychological. The methodology Participatory Action Research This study was designed according to the needs and approaches that were made by the women participating, so it was outlined as an investigation aimed to perform "an intervention addressed to change", which is, precisely, the main characteristic of the so called participatory action research. Since our intention is to carry out an investigation on the violence in the churches and their need to "learn", as they said, and to have analytical tools, we decided to propose this work as a collective process in which the participants themselves could undertake a critical review of the ethos of religious patriarchy as a livelihood of violence against women, all from their experience as women living the faith. The concept of "participation" begins, in fact, by the identification with a social or collective group; in this case, our identification is with groups of women: The first awareness of participation by the actors is, therefore, as a member of a collective entity that acquires the characteristics of community (Callejo and Viedma, 2015, p. 296). This is because from the focus research-action, participation and empowerment are the two sides of the same coin. From here and projected on a collective level, we understand empowerment as the capacity of the people who make up that group to set a "common will." Without a doubt, this "common will" is to try to make a contribution in the fight against violence that women suffer, becoming aware that we can act if we do it together. 7 As we see, participatory action research is "applied" research, but does not treat members as passive subjects or acting as professional experts, designing a project, collecting data, interpreting results and recommending actions. Nothing would be further from our intent and work. Women have participated beginning at the way they understand the entire process, to the discussion of the results, the elaboration of conclusions and the projection of future actions. Finally, the fact of making a process of awareness and of producing knowledge in a collective way implies a strategic purpose of the participatory action research: [...] This awareness must be exemplary and expansive, that is to say, it is not enough what happens in the framework of the workshops of the PAR, actors involved must become agents of social change, spreading their transformation in the society, being examples for that society that can be changed through participation in these processes (Callejo and Viedma, 2015, p. 313). Therefore, we consider essential to elaborate material that would serve not only to be able to work this process with the participating women, but also to be employed so that they themselves could replicate these workshops and have the necessary elements to be able to carry it out. The purposes criticism from the experience The next question we need to ask ourselves within the framework of the methodological reflection is: Where are we going to have the “purposes criticism of the religious patriarchy” from? In this research this criticism analysis will be carried out by the participating women of the research from their experience in different ecclesial spaces. In this research, as we pointed out, we will use the gender category to critically analyse the patriarchal structures and androcentric speeches of religions, as feminist theology proposes, with a fundamental political intent: to bring to light its sexist and discriminatory substrate, because, without a doubt, this is the basis of the exercise of violence against women. For this, and as we will explain in detail later, we will carry out, along with the participating women, a journey that will help us visualize the ethos of religious patriarchy, which unfortunately leads to violence against women. This journey consists of four fundamental stages: 8 - Theological reflection from the experience of being a woman (analysis of biblical texts and the patriarchal nucleus of biblical traditions). - Analysis of roles and stereotypes (analysis of the role of women in the context of religious ideology). - Analysis of situations of discrimination and exclusion of women arising from the existence of those roles and stereotypes (analysis of the relations of inequality between men and women). - Identification and analysis of the different forms of violence against women within the framework of the churches (justification of the violence in the churches, reaction and attitude towards violence against women, specific forms of violence against women from the churches: physical, psychological and symbolic). This journey will be carried out by twenty-seven women belonging to two churches of different denominations and a third group that we have called ecumenical (nine from the ecumenical, seven from the Catholic and eleven from the Methodist). These women are committed to their community and built from the faith. A fundamental question that we are going to try to answer by making the proposed journey with them is: how do they build themselves as women from the faith? To this end, it is proposed to carry out a critical review of the main characteristics of religious patriarchy, from the experience of these women who build and live their faith from different religious contexts. This exercise entails, in turn, an awareness of the path we must take to understand how and why violence against women occurs in the churches. All this has the purpose of finding ways of acting that help transform the churches from a denunciation to the dominant patriarchal system. The selected sample Proposing an investigation like this is not a simple matter. As we said at the beginning, violence against women in churches is a covert problem; for this reason, the selected sample came from those groups that did have a specific interest in reflecting on this issue, training and finally being able to act accordingly. An important aspect was, undoubtedly, the diversification of the sample, that is, to be able to carry out the work with women belonging to churches of different denominations; this 9 would give us great richness in the analysis, since instead of wanting to generalize results, what was sought was to collect the diversity of existing approaches. As we know, no religion is monolithic, because within each one there are more progressive "trends" and others more conservative. Therefore, we do not consider that the women with whom we have worked are "representatives" of each denomination in its generality (Methodist and Catholic); to sustain this would be a serious mistake on our part. In reality, they are groups of women who already brought specific experience and background with them that characterize them and that tend more to have a critical vision regarding religious patriarchy and an initial awareness related to the subject of violence against women within the framework of the churches. We say "initial" because, as we will see, for many of them being part of this process was an experience that opened their eyes in relation to many issues, even to consider it as a "liberating process". The sample is composed of a group of Methodist women from El Alto (from the Feminine Federation of the District of El Alto), another from Catholic women from La Paz (Levadura group) and a group made up of women who no longer belong to any church (but they did before) as well as others that are part of different churches, all of them gathered around an independent educational project in El Alto (ecumenical group). Actually, this last group is independent and, as we said, does not belong as a collective to any church; the reasons why this is so are closely related to the discrimination of women in churches. This matter seemed fundamental to us to carry out the process with them, since we consider that their contribution could be very useful and enriching, as indeed it was. We have called it "ecumenical" because it really includes women who, individually, belonged or belong to different churches and who have very different experiences. Finally, the sample of women selected for the interviews was directed to fulfil these objectives: to understand better the history of each group and its ecclesial context, and to deepen the theme of violence against women in the churches. Another important criterion was to select women who exercised leadership in the churches to be able to analyse from that experience the indicated themes. Likewise, an interview was conducted with a Lutheran pastor, and although we also tried to form a group that corresponded to this denomination, we did not achieve that goal. 10 The method of critical analysis of the ethos of religious patriarchy As we already pointed out, this method we elaborated consists of four steps2, which we detail below. PHASE I: Theological reflection from the experience of being a woman (analysis of biblical texts and the patriarchal nucleus of biblical traditions) Of the multiple methods of feminist hermeneutics posed by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza (text and translation, imaginative identification, women as authors and interpreters of the Bible, historical interpretation, etc.), in the case of this research, we fundamentally rely on two: sociocultural reconstruction and ideological ascription. One of the fundamental methodological achievements of the historical criticism of the Bible was the understanding that the Sitz im Leben, the situation, the environment, of a text is as important for its understanding as the formulation itself. The biblical texts are not a literally inspired revelation and they are not doctrinal principles either, they are rather historical formulations in the context of a religious community. Although this point of view is currently questioned both by literary formalism as well as by textual biblicisim, it nevertheless remains fundamental for any historical reconstruction (Schüssler Fiorenza, 1989, p.19). This reconstruction proceeds, therefore, from the idea that the biblical texts do not inform us about "facts", they are rather rhetorical constructions that followed political and religious interests; this is what the author calls "ideological ascription". In the case of this work, we opted to confront women with patriarchal and discriminatory texts to carry out hermeneutical work from their own experience. After reading, the participating women had to express whether they agreed or not with the message sent by these texts and, finally, make a collective reflection. The selected texts are the following. The first block of texts has to do with the requirement of submission to women and their duty to carry out the functions of care (Ephesians 5, 22-27 and 1 Timothy 2, 11-15). 2 While the four steps were maintained in the work with the three groups, it is important to note that in the case of the activities that compose the process we had to introduce variations due to the need to adapt to the profiles of the participating women (for example, their educational level and their age). 11 The second block deals with the prohibition to participate in public space, the obligation to act in the domestic space and the chain of generational submission (1 Corinthians 14, 3435 and Titus 2, 3-5). The third block of texts refers to the woman's body and the impurity that is used as a justification for the inability of women to access the sacred (1Timothy 2, 8-10 and Leviticus 15, 19-20.21.28-29, 31). The second part of this first stage of critical review of the ethos of religious patriarchy focuses on the analysis of "feminine referents" in the Bible. For this work, we selected several women in the Bible, in some cases they are women who, precisely, broke the androcentric and patriarchal vision that is manifested in the texts previously treated. Each case is accompanied by a brief text of the Bible that offers some details about each woman. In this exercise, we asked the participants to tell us which woman they felt most identified with and why. We also asked them to mention other feminine references they might have and the reasons for that. These are the feminine referents selected for their analysis: - The Virgin Mary (Luke 2, 16-19 and 34-35) - Mary Magdalene (Luke 8, 1-3 and Mark 15, 40-41) - Marta and Mary (Lucas 10, 38-42) - Deborah (Judges 4, 3-5) - Junia (Romans 16.7) PHASE II: Analysis of roles and stereotypes (analysis of the role of women in the context of religious ideology) The biblical texts and the feminine references analysed show different roles and stereotypes assigned to women, this helped us to ask the following questions to the participants: In a Church context. How are women expected to be? What roles are they expected to comply? These two questions propose precisely the theme of roles and stereotypes that we analyse in the context of each church. To complete this stage, we prepared specific material in which the concepts of gender, role and stereotype are clarified in a didactic way, explanations that are always accompanied by quotations drawn from the interventions of the women themselves. This is a fundamental 12 element, since through their own reflections they become aware of how they perform the process themselves. After working on these documents, we asked the women to answer the following questions: - Something characteristic of my gender that I like to do (in the Church / community and in the family) - Something characteristic of my gender that I do not like to do (in the Church / community and in the family) - Something not characteristic of my gender that I would like to do without being censured (in the Church / community and in the family) PHASE III: Analysis of situations of discrimination and exclusion of women derived from the existence of these roles and stereotypes (analysis of the relations of inequality between men and women) In the third stage of this journey, we also prepared specific material to deal with discrimination against women that derives from roles and stereotypes. In this instrument, the concept is described and quotes extracted from the interventions made by the women in the working groups were also incorporated. After the collective reflection we presented the following questions: - Do you think there is unequal treatment between men and women in your community/Church? Why? Give an example - Have you ever felt discriminated against in your Church / community? Explain the situation. - Do you believe that faith (or the way of interpreting it) has something to do with the unequal treatment between men and women? Why? PHASE IV: Identification and analysis of the different forms of violence against women within the framework of the churches (justification of violence in the churches, reaction and attitude towards violence against women, specific forms of violence against women fro m the churches: physical, psychological and symbolic) 13 In order to work on the issue of violence against women in churches, we selected three dimensions of analysis with the aim of doing it in the most complete and rigorous possible way. These dimensions are: - The justification of violence against women in churches (associated with the breakdown of roles and stereotypes made by women). - The reaction of churches to cases of violence against women (Is the Church a safe space for women who suffer violence? Do churches give real support to women who suffer violence?) - Specific forms of violence against women in churches. o Physical violence: the woman does not own her own body o Psychological violence: women are not recognized as religious subjects o Symbolic violence: focusing on being a good wife, mother and housewife We prepared the material to carry out the work sessions. Before working on the material, we carried out the following exercise (so that the answers were not conditioned): From the following statements, indicate which ones you think refer to some type of violence against women (physical, psychological and symbolic violence) in the Church's environment. Plead the reasons for this. • Religions seek to control female sexuality and condemn the expression and enjoyment of sexuality for women with much more severity than for men. • To impose silence on women and not to evaluate their testimony on equal terms with men. • Not to allow women to plan the family. • To consider women inferior by nature. • To demand submission to the husband. • Codes of behaviour (do not access the altar) and clothing (long skirts...). • To transmit the idea that being a good woman means being a mother, wife, housewife and good believer. 14 • To justify macho behaviours or legitimize patriarchal practices. • Not to be recognized as a religious subject (cannot be pastors). • To justify violence against women (physical violence exercised by the husband). After working collectively they were given the material and they reflected on the different types of violence within their churches. The interviews As we already pointed out, in order to better understand the ecclesial context of the different groups and also to be able to deepen into the topics we worked on, we chose to interview different members of the selected groups. - Methodist group (two interviews) - Catholic group (one interview) - Ecumenical group (one interview) For this work, the unstructured or open interview modality was chosen following a flexible question and content scheme, and improvising according to need. All this because it is based on the idea that interviews are forms of social interaction that generate shared knowledge, therefore the quality of the information will depend a lot on the communication capacity that we have as interlocutors. Of course, in all cases we made the well-known "communicative contract" explaining the meaning and objective of the interview and we committed ourselves to safeguard the identity of women, same as in the case of the working groups. Some conclusions It is important to note that once the analysis and interpretation of all the information obtained from the working groups has been carried out, we conducted a validation process with each group. What we proposed to the participating women in this research was to collectively analyse the conclusions we had drawn from the whole process, with a double objective: to confirm our fidelity to the narrative data and to favour confrontation with certain ideas resulting from our analysis and interpretation work. 15 As the conclusions of this work are numerous due to the large amount of information obtained during the process, we chose to make a selection of the results that seemed key to us in the process and also we highlighted the most controversial or the ones that had caused greater difficulties in the working groups. The results of the validation process were very satisfactory, since in addition to confirming the rigor of our work, the women continued to deepen the main approaches derived from the entire study, they confronted themselves and learned the conclusions of the other working groups. Next, we summarize the main conclusions of this work. Regarding the analysis of biblical texts • The Bible cannot be changed, but its interpretation can and should vary, since there is not a single true reading that matches the one made by men (whether shepherds or priests), which often puts women in second place. • It is necessary for women to make their own interpretations of biblical texts, seeing reality from their experience and with thoughts of women. • Many times, women do not speak in churches according to their own thoughts because they fear criticism from their husbands and the rest of the members of the Church. • Even though there have been certain changes in the participation of women in churches (there are female local pastors, communion ministers, readers, etc.), women consider that there is still machismo, exclusion and discrimination, and that there are many concepts (that of sin, for example) that have not evolved. According to the participants, the solution depends on the women themselves, to take the initiative and fight to change this situation. • Although one of the sisters of the ecumenical group says that faith gives you courage to face the difficulties of life, participating women (both the ecumenical and the Methodist group) insist that they do not have time to prepare themselves and they fear to fail and be criticized. Why does not faith give them the courage they need to participate in churches and change things? 16 Analysis of gender roles and stereotypes • Both Catholic and ecumenical groups found it difficult to reflect on "what is expected of me as a woman" and whether or not this matches "what I want to do". This shows us a weakness in the construction of a gender consciousness. • There is a clear identification of the three groups with gender roles linked to the stereotype of a "housewife" woman: they like to cook, clean, organize and take care of their children. • In the context of the Church, they like to work with children (ecumenical group), help, serve, decorate the temple, attend the Eucharist and pray (Catholic group). We see that this role of gender is maintained or projected in the churches (taking care of children and forming them is women's typical task, such as decorating the church or serving). • Regarding the breakdown of gender roles, in several cases the sisters of the ecumenical group say that they would like to be "the head of the family", that is, to assume a role intended for men (making decisions in the family) , but this implies censorship and criticism. • The members of the three groups express their desire to perform leadership functions and positions of authority in their respective churches (being a pastor, being a bishop, being a missionary, etc.) as roles that are not specific to women, but they would like exercise without being censored. Study of the ways of exclusion and discrimination • One of the reasons traditionally argued, from the Methodist Church, to deny a woman the right to be a pastor is to affirm that since pastors have to travel through the countryside and the provinces, a single woman runs the risk of being raped. This is another example of direct discrimination. • In the Catholic Church, the participation of women is often limited to service tasks (helping in the parish or temple); women cannot participate freely and creatively. This is a form of direct discrimination. • In the Catholic Church, the first to discriminate are those who say that there should be no discrimination, priests, because women cannot celebrate the Eucharist, consecration, confession or baptisms (except in extreme cases of imminent death). This is a form of direct discrimination. 17 Reflection on different ways of violence against women • There are difficulties in affirming that there are some pastors in the Methodist churches who justify violence against women based on the breakdown of gender roles by women. • Methodist women who suffer violence cannot say so in church nor can they tell pastors what happens to them. • In the Catholic Church there is no talk of violence against women -not in sermons or catechesis- because it is supposed to be something "distant" from the Church and that does not happen in an environment of Catholic families who follow an idealized model of "sacred family". • The women of the Catholic group raise the existence of a double moral, since there is violence against women in Catholic families, performed by lay people and even by catechists or ministers, and there is no questioning. • Some female members of the Methodist group believe in order to avoid violence in the homes, women have to be silent because that is what the Bible says and because the word of the Lord must be understood. • Neither pastors nor priests offer real help to women who experience violence in their homes; they limit themselves to talk and give some indications (hang in there, dialogue, reflect, forgive, etc.) that only maintains the situation as it is. They do not follow up or get involved in the problem. • In the Methodist Church, pastors do not question men who have exercised violence against their wives because men cover each other's backs, especially for women do not denounce and avoid a problem of damaged prestige in the Church. Final reflections of the groups • The sisters recognize that within the Methodist Church it is necessary to work on this problem, since it is worrisome that women do not know how to identify situations of violence that they may be living. • The sisters of the Catholic group recognize that at the beginning of the work sessions, the issue of violence against women was seen "from afar", as something external, but little by little they became involved and now to perform a deeper exploration of the problem. 18 • The Catholic group states that it is necessary to create spaces to analyse and work on the issue of violence against women within the framework of the churches. To become aware that religion is lived with a lot of violence they concluded after the whole process. • Finally, the ecumenical group establishes the need to form groups to work on the issue of violence. BIBLIOGRAPHY Álvarez, A. (2001). El feminismo como prevención de la violencia de género. En A. Bernárdez (ed.), Violencia de género y sociedad: Una cuestión de poder (pp. 157-174). Madrid: Instituto de Investigaciones Feministas. Amorós, C. (1992). Notas para una teoría nominalista del patriarcado. Asparkia. Investigación feminista, 1, 41-58. España: Universitat Jaume I. Boff, L. (1979). El rostro materno de Dios. Ensayo interdisciplinar sobre lo femenino y sus formas religiosas. Madrid: Ediciones Paulinas. Callejo J y Viedma A (2015): “La investigación acción-participativa” en Ferrando MG, Alvira F, Alonso L y Escobar M: El análisis de la realidad social. Métodos y técnicas de investigación. Madrid: Alianza Editorial. Córdova, J. (2016). 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