Women of Hope
The first time we became really aware of the extent of gender-based violence in El Salvador, was around 2012. We were on our third trip to El Salvador, one day as we were on our way to minister to some kids from an orphanage, we drove through a town called Suchitoto which sits about 30 minutes outside of the capital San Salvador. As we drove through the cobble stone streets of this beautiful colonial town, we noticed that on almost every door post of people’s homes was a spray-painted sign.
We started to get curious as it was the exact same sign on almost every door. As we continued driving through, the word that caught our eye was ‘violencia’ which means violence. We stopped quickly to read the signs which said “En esta casa queremos una vida libre de violencia hacia las mujeres” which means “In this house we want a life free from violence against women”. Up until that that point, we were largely unaware of the extent or the magnitude of gender-based violence in El Salvador.
Knowing what we know now about this issue, to describe this level of violence as an epidemic is simply not an overstatement nor is it an exaggeration and unfortunately the struggle for women in El Salvador is not something new. The fact is, that women in El Salvador have been brutalised for generations.
For years now, El Salvador has had the highest rate of femicide (the killing of a woman because she is a woman) in the world and tragically this year alone we are told that there has been 30% increase in those numbers. In particular the rate of kidnappings disappearances of adolescent girls has skyrocketed in the past decade.
Generations upon generations of women in El Salvador are being brutalised and traumatised.
We believe in the rights, value, worth and dignity of the Salvadorean girl and of the Salvadorean woman and we want to do our part and come alongside them. That is the why we have launched our new Salvador’s HOPE initiative ‘Women of HOPE’!
Women of Hope is an initiative with a vision of empowering girls, women and communities to combat the increasing numbers of adolescent girls and women targeted by gender-based violence in El Salvador.
We are excited to announce that over the next few months, we will be delivering our first violence prevention program - Girls of Hope! This six-week program has been written by Salvador's HOPE and created especially for adolescent girls living in high at-risk communities.
We will be delivering this program through our new Women of Hope initiative with our first group of 15 girls taking part over the coming weeks. We will be running this program in the region of Soyapango, a notoriously dangerous area of San Salvador. We would appreciate your prayers for the safety of our partners and for our very first group of little girls as they go through the program.
We are incredibly thankful for the opportunity to impart hope and light into their lives!
Girls of Hope! Violence prevention program
Our aim is to provide nurture and support through this program whilst educating young girls on emotional and physical abuse, domestic violence and on personal safety and regard.
This program has been written and created especially for adolescents girls aged 11-13 years old.
Girls of Hope! is step number one of our long term vision of investing into the lives of precious girls.
Stay tuned for more information as this project develops!
Once again, Thank You for your valuable support!
"We believe that every woman and girl have a right to live free from violence. Our vision is to create a space for girls where they can dream and become all that they can be"
-Vania Labios
