Resources

The goal of the Tangiraneza “Start Well” Innovation Child Survival Project (ICSP) was to reduce morbidity, mortality, and improve nutritional status of children under five and pregnant women in Nyamagabe District, Southern Province, Rwanda. The project’s objective was to improve…

Channels of Hope research findings presentation- Building the evidence base on the role of local faith leaders to critical issues to enhance outcomes towards SDGs *Presentation for Dec 2016 Mobilization of Local Faith Communities Hub meeting Christo Greyling

World Vision’s Mobilizing for Maternal and Neonatal Health through Birth Spacing and Advocacy (MOMENT) project focuses on improving maternal, neonatal, and child health (MNCH) by increasing community-led advocacy, political advocacy and US/Canadian funding for global health. The community-led advocacy, through…

Development Across Faith Boundaries investigates the dynamics of cross-faith partnerships in a range of development contexts, from India, Cambodia and Myanmar, to Melanesia, Bosnia, Ethiopia and Afghanistan. The book demonstrates how far FBOs extend their activities beyond their own faith communities…

Road Map to Resilient Communities: Church Agencies Network, Disaster Operations.

Matthew Frost delivers opening remarks of the Religious & Faith-based Communities Perspectives Panel. To watch the video, please click the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRaCrT3dnJY

A strategic review of Oxfam's work in Haiti between 2011 and 2014. To download this and other Oxfam resources, click here: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/research-publications/

This report on the observations of field staff working in a variety of countries where girls are commonly married before they are fully physically or emotionally grown. The report illustrates the causes and human costs of early marriage in 15 countries…

Gender, Religion and Humanitarian Responses to Refugees Policy brief summarises key points and recommendations for policy, practise and research emerging from debate and discussion that took place at the workshop- 13th May 2016 It is a time for open and…

This is an overview by women and men of faith and human rights actors, on the relationship between human rights and their respective faith traditions. These authors straddle the worlds of religious leadership, while  advocating for gender equality and human…

The Faith Alliance for Health commits from 2016-2020 to strengthen national and local faith networks of faith leaders and organizations to build their influence to bear and use their assets to eliminate preventable deaths of women, children, and adolescents. This…

This brief highlights potential areas for dialogue and action that build on common concern for families and social justice. It draws on the Georgetown University Berkley Center/World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD) 2011 review of faith and maternal health.

The leadership of the Church in the Philippines has historically exercised a powerful influence on politics and social life. The country is at least 80% Catholic and there is a deeply ingrained cultural deference for clergy and religious. Previous attempts in the last 14 years to pass a reproductive health law have failed because of the opposition of Catholic bishops. Thus the recent passage of the ‘Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012’ (R.A.
10354) was viewed by some Filipinos as a stunning failure for the Church and a sign of its diminished influence on Philippine society. This article proposes that the Church’s engagement in the reproductive health bill (RH Bill) debate and the manner of its discourse undermined its own campaign to block the law. The first part of the article gives a historical overview of the Church’s opposition to government family planning programs. The second part discusses key points of conflict in the RH Bill debate. The third part will examine factors that shaped the Church’s attitude and responses to the RH Bill. The fourth part will examine the effects of the debate on the Church’s unity, moral authority, and role in Philippine society. The fifth part will draw lessons for the Church and will explore paths that the Church community can take in response to the challenges arising from the law’s implementation.

When it comes to dealing with population growth, there are a number of misconceptions about the position of the Catholic Church. Official teaching during the twentieth century gradually moved toward the acceptance of limiting family size and endorsed the concept of responsible parenthood during the Second Vatican Council. One cannot, therefore, justifiably claim that the church is against birth control. It is an entirely different matter, however, when it comes to the practical question about how a couple might go about regulating fertility. Since the publication of Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical, an intense controversy has taken place within the church about the use of artificial contraception. Behind that controversy lies an important methodological issue. For, the traditional teaching to which Paul VI returned in his letter was based upon the presumption that it is possible to morally judge a physical, material act without any consideration of the persons who performed that act, the circumstances within which it took place, or the reasons why the act was chosen. This behavioural approach to morality stands in some contrast to the way that other moral questions are dealt with. Inflicting pain or even taking a person’s life, for instance, can be justified for a good reason when one acts in a virtuous manner to instil discipline or safeguard justice. Until this methodological controversy is addressed, the problem of using artificial means to regulate fertility will not be resolved. A helpful key for solving the methodological ambiguities is to use moral language in a consistent and understandable manner.

The “Christian Sermon Guide to Save the Lives of Mothers and Newborns” is a tool for Christian religious leaders on how to guide their followers through a safe reproductive process from pregnancy through infancy. It presents the magnitude of worldwide concern with maternal and infant mortality but argues that the problem is solvable. The instructions include not only guidelines for safe health and sanitation practices, but also recommendations for how Christian leaders might instill these standards and values in their congregations through addressing the issues in the context of sermons with Biblical references included.

This report reviews the work of faith-inspired leaders, communities, and organizations in worldwide efforts to reduce maternal mortality. Maternal mortality rates represent one of the most extreme cases of inequality in public health worldwide, but decades of global action have failed to remedy the gap between wealthy and poorer countries when it comes to maternal health. However, recent evidence that global maternal mortality is decreasing significantly, if gradually, has helped strengthen momentum and refocus attention on the issue.

The toolkit has been designed to be a practical resource for our staff and is designed to be used in tandem with existing guidelines. We hope, insh’Allah, that this toolkit will not only be used by Islamic Relief staff, but also by colleagues from other agencies who are working with Muslim communities towards building lasting peace. To this end we have included a separate ‘Introduction’ for readers who are less familiar with Islam and Muslim communities.

This toolkit draws from current knowledge and best practice across the field, but approaches each area of work from an Islamic perspective and offers suggestions to the reader on how they might approach programming in conflict-affected areas from that basis. The tools included should be considered as facilitating (not as an alternative to) context specific approaches. Readers are actively encouraged to re-design and amend tools and approaches to reflect the knowledge and experience of their beneficiaries.

The success of integrated sustainable development (ISD) entirely rests upon a firm foundation of sound analysis of the following: Start-up assessment, Well-being and assets, Structural causes of poverty, Vulnerabilities to shocks and climate change, Opportunity analysis.

This report summarizes the USAID | Health Policy Initiative, Task Order 1 project titled The Role of Religious Communities in Addressing Gender-based Violence and HIV, which was designed and implemented by Futures Group International and Religions for Peace. Recognizing the importance of collaborating to prevent and reduce gender-based violence (GBV) and HIV among women and girls, the Initiative partners formulated the project to improve the capacity of religious leaders and faith-based organizations (FBOs) to respond to GBV and its links to HIV.

Policy note prepared for the UNHCR Dialogue on Faith & Protection in December 2012 based upon the JLI Scoping Report on LFCs and resilience.

This report is a compiled from two pieces of research commissioned by
Tearfund’s HIV & Sexual Violence Unit. The full reports and researchers are:
– Sexual violence in South Africa and the role of the church by Elisabet
le Roux at the Unit for Religion and Development Research at
Stellenbosch University
– Breaking the Silence (full report) by Robyn Curran, Bongi Zengele and
Solange Mukamana.

A Technical Brief for the Capacity Project describing faith leaders’ impact in low-income settings.

The extent of faith-based organizations’ participation within the overall health systems of developing countries is unclear. Recent reports state that faith-based organizations play a substantial role in providing healthcare in developing countries, cited in some publications as up to 70% of all healthcare services. The data behind these numbers are sometimes difficult to pinpoint and seem at odds to national and regional survey data.

Global disparities in maternal and newborn health represent one of the starkest health inequities
of our times. Faith-based organizations (FBOs) have historically played an important role in providing
maternal/newborn health services in African countries. However, the contribution of FBOs in service delivery
is insufficiently recognized and mapped.

!is report has been produced as part of the Global Initiative for Faith, Health, and Development (GIFHD). GIFHD
seeks to serve as a bridge between faith and secular development communities, to give voice to the concerns and
capacities of the faith sector, and to advocate for the full engagement of the faith sector with governments, bilateral and
multilateral institutions, other civil society actors, and private philanthropy. !e Global Initiative is convened and
supported by the Center for Interfaith Action on Global Poverty (CIFA), a Washington DC-based organization committed
to building the collective capacity of the international faith community to increase its impact on poverty and disease.

This report presents findings from a mapping initiative that aimed to capture how faith-based organizations respond to violence against women and girls in the Asia-Pacific region. As a collaborative initiative between UNFPA and the Asia-Pacific Women Faith and Development Alliance (AP-WFDA), it sought to identify examples of strategies used by faith-based organizations. The report brings together the experiences of 58 organizations collected through an online survey, supplemented by in-depth interviews conducted with selected agencies. Importantly, the survey results represent only a small proportion of the faith-based organizations addressing violence against women and girls across the region.

This third volume in the series focuses on ways to ‘map’ (in the different uses of that terminology) faith-inspired providers, and on assessment of their cost for patients and the extent to which they succeed in reaching the poor.

This document examines whether and how FBOs’ approaches to development work are unique to NGOs engaged in similar activities in the same contexts.

A summary of the HIV AIDS and Maternal Health JLI F&LC report.

This Report, a product of the JLI F&Lc Learning Hub on HIV AIDS and Maternal Health reviews the available data on the nexus between faith, maternal health and HIV AIDS development work, against the framework of specific questions. The report summarizes the evidence, discusses opportunities and challenges, makes recommendations for practice and for further research.

This review documents Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, and inter-faith initiatives in Cambodia and their varying response to HIV. This review highlights their contributions to HIV/AIDS and the important role they play in development of families, women, and children.

This literature review by ARHAP focuses on the intersection of religion and health in sub-Saharan Africa, mostly focusing on HIV/AIDS spanning a 10 year period. This review provides insight into how these systems interact and poses questions for further research.

A review of Tearfund partners in Chad and Malawi exploring how local, faith-based responses to HIV strengthen health systems. Research focuses on Christian organizations and national and local-level stakeholders.

A review of what is and is not known regarding faith institutions and their work to improve health in Africa.

A review of research from Malawi, DRC, and South Africa regarding practices and opinions of sexual health and couple decision making.

An overview of Catholic responses to HIV including challenges and successes

This report is part of an expanded partnership between the WHO and FBOs in facing health challenges, specifically HIV/AIDS.

A review of efforts of faith based providers working to improve maternal health.