Through the Eyes of a Woman

I used to like watching sports on TV but have now almost given up. Olympic games have lost some of their interest for me due to the enormous scope and the impossibility of getting full coverage and information about so many events. And still, as the 2020 Olympic games in Tokyo were just kicked off on July 23, 2021, these postponed games just became more interesting for me when I read that almost 49 percent of participating athletes will be women. All 206 National Olympic Committees also have at least one female and one male athlete representative. Gender balance in sport has finally almost been achieved. I realize that this is a result of individual women who have spent years in training to become the best they can be in their chosen sport, but also of making more and more sports open to women. The American First Lady Jill Biden expressed it in these words when she addressed the US athletes in Tokyo: "For most of you, the journey to Tokyo began long, long ago. It likely star

Living in a temperate climate, I have been used to having cold winters and warm summers. We never thought we would need air conditioning. But things have changed. We are in the middle of climate change and scientists are saying that we have almost passed the point of no return. The last two summers were extremely dry and hot. This summer we are having a mixture of heat and thunderstorms causing vast amounts of rain, and flooding. Hail is clogging the sewers and destroying crops. Streets are transformed into fast-flowing rivers, houses are flooded and even collapsing. Rivers and lakes overflow their banks. Rescue services are working at capacity and still, we hear of people drowning or not being accounted for. I am shocked at the news reports of calamities from all over. Many have lost everything to the flood. Even in areas that are used to flooding, people say that they have never experienced anything like this. In other parts of the world, the problem is extreme heat. When polar regi

     The former Finnish President Mauno Koivisto (1982-1994) was known for his cryptic words. One of the best-known phrases he used from time to time in his vernacular was: „Tarttis tehrä jotain“ – “We should do something “. Even if he didn’t know exactly what should be done, he was optimistic that things would sort themselves out as long as we do something. Another of his favorite idioms was „Kyllä se siitä“ – meaning “ It'll be OK.“ It's a comforting phrase meaning that even in a bad situation you can survive. I have been reminded of these words during the last couple of years as silence has seemed to descend on the question of women’s ordination in the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. After the disastrous Annual Council of 2019 at which several church organizations received a warning for noncompliance, the matter was ignored in the hopes that the uproar would subside. At least that is the impression a “normal“ church member like me gets. I don’t know what discussions have

Helene Lange, a Women’s Rights activist and politician, who campaigned for equal rights to education and professions for girls in Germany lived from 1848 to1930. She hoped that women and men would one day be treated equally and said in 1904, „When the final goal of the women’s movement will have been reached, there will no longer be a dominant gender, but only leading personalities.” [1] Studies show that countries in which women play an important role in society are the most economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable. Without equality and inclusion of all genders in decisions, the problems of this world cannot be solved. In my Finnish mother tongue, there are no gendered pronouns like “he” and “she.” There is only one word: “hän” for people and “se” for things. Even nouns have no gender. One does not differentiate occupational titles, whether the person is male or female—they are all described with the same word. Maybe that has also had an impact on the sociological deve