The Nov. 24 event at the Sita Rama Hindu Temple in the West Yorkshire city of Huddersfield celebrated both the United Nations’ International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and the United Kingdom’s National Interfaith Week.
During the event, members of many faith traditions connected with each other in prayer and reflection and worked to create practical and theoretical symbols of equality and justice through art (such as the equality symbols collage pictured above).
"We must continue to fundamentally challenge the culture of discrimination that allows any form of violence, particularly against women and girls,” said Kiran, the former chair of the Huddersfield Interfaith Council. “The mere threat of violence is one of the most significant barriers to women’s equality and a violation of their human rights. The culture of impunity and a stigma further punishes victims who have endured crime. As people of diverse faiths and traditions, we speak out to condemn violence that results in, physical, sexual or mental suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or deprivation of liberty."
