FOCCISA Health and Gender Justice Network

Faith communities in Southern Africa are both part of the problem and part of the solution when it comes to gender-based violence. Religious teaching has been used to silence survivors, demand reconciliation with abusers, and frame women's subordination as divinely ordained. At the same time, churches and faith communities are where millions of South Africans spend significant parts of their lives — where their values are formed, where they turn in crisis, and where community norms are reinforced or challenged.

The FOCCISA Health and Gender Justice Network (FHGJN) exists precisely in this contested space: a faith-based organisation working inside church structures to shift those structures from complicity in violence to active agents of dignity and justice.

What is FOCCISA?

FOCCISA — the Fellowship of Christian Councils in Southern Africa — is an ecumenical body coordinating national Councils of Churches across eleven southern African countries. Each national Council typically has between 16 and 25 member denominations. The reach is therefore vast: through training and awareness raising of church leaders and lay people in all member bodies, FHGJN describes its work as reaching "every corner of the countries with people who work for change and social justice in our communities." With 580+ volunteers and operations across eleven countries, FHGJN's physical footprint is geographically extensive.

The South African secretariat is based at 4 Gordon Drive, La Lucia, uMhlanga, KwaZulu-Natal.

What FHGJN Does

FHGJN's stated goal is to ensure "the equality and dignity of every human being irrespective of gender, skin colour, social status, health, ethnic background, religious believes, age, sexual orientation, social class or abilities." This is an unusually inclusive mandate for a faith-based organisation in the southern African context — explicitly naming sexual orientation as a protected characteristic is a significant commitment.

In practice, FHGJN's activities include:

Interfaith dialogue and training: FHGJN facilitates dialogues between religious leaders and LGBTQIA+ persons, addressing human sexuality and gender identity within church communities — working to reduce the religious hostility that makes many survivors (particularly LGBTQIA+ survivors) afraid to seek help from faith-based services.

HIV/AIDS engagement: Drawing on lessons from the HIV/AIDS pandemic, FHGJN works with faith communities to apply those lessons — around stigma, disclosure, community care, and systemic advocacy — to current health and gender justice challenges.

The One Body Program: FHGJN's active continental programme, which includes visits to member countries (including Malawi, documented in 2024) to hold dialogues on Kairos (present-moment action), Sankofa (learning from the past), culture, HIV/AIDS lessons, sexuality and gender identity, legal contexts, and the role of the church.

Awareness and community mobilisation: Through its network of 580+ volunteers and partnerships with national Councils of Churches, FHGJN supports community-level action for gender equality, health justice, and the protection of marginalised groups.

FHGJN and GBV Survivors

FHGJN is not a crisis service. It does not operate a shelter, a counselling line, or a direct support programme for individual GBV survivors. Its work is structural and systemic — changing the faith community environment in which GBV is normalised and survivors are silenced.

For a GBV survivor, FHGJN's relevance is indirect but real: it is working to ensure that when a survivor turns to her pastor, priest, or faith community for help, she is met with justice rather than blame. It is training the religious leaders and church structures that survivors encounter, and creating the cultural conditions in which disclosure is safer.

For site visitors who are faith leaders, social workers, or community members wanting to engage churches in GBV prevention and response, FHGJN is a significant resource and potential partner.

FHGJN: 4 Gordon Drive, La Lucia, uMhlanga, KZN, 4051. Phone: 079 613 7436. Email: info@fhgjn.org. Website: fhgjn.org.za. Part of FOCCISA.