Pope Francis Says To ‘Hurt a Woman is to Insult God' in New Year Message

Pope Francis has been speaking out against domestic violence as a resurgence of violence against women in Europe has been registered since the COVID-19 pandemic began.

Pope Francis has called for an end to violence against women.

"How much violence is directed against women! Enough! To hurt a woman is to insult God, who from a woman took on our humanity - not through an angel, not directly, but through a woman," said the pontiff, referring to the Virgin Mary.

The 85-year-old Pope was delivering his New Year message at a Mass in St Peter's Basilica in the Vatican as he called for “greater efforts to promote mothers and to protect women”. The Roman Catholic Church reveres 1 January as the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God which celebrates "the part played by Mary in the mystery of salvation". New Year's Day is also the Church's World Day of Peace.

In his New Year's homily, the Pope said:

“And since mothers bestow life, and women keep the world [together], let us all make greater efforts to promote mothers and to protect women.”

All can work together to build a more peaceful world, starting from the hearts of individuals and relationships in the family, then within society and with the environment, and all the way up to relationships between peoples and nations. #WorlddayofPeace https://t.co/noEyomi9w4

— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) January 1, 2022

Europe has seen a deadly resurgence of violence against women since the start of the pandemic when lockdowns which were put in place to curb the spread of the disease left many women trapped in the home with a possible abuser.

A report from UN Women, which brought together data collected in 13 countries across all regions (Kenya, Thailand, Ukraine, Cameroon, Albania, Bangladesh, Colombia, Paraguay, Nigeria, Cote D’Ivoire, Morocco, Jordan, and Kyrgyzstan), confirmed that the coronavirus pandemic had “increased women’s experiences of violence and eroded their feelings of safety.”

Some European countries released official statistics for 2021, showing that in Spain, for example, since the coronavirus state of emergency ended in May, one woman has been killed every three days, compared with an average of one a week before that.

"With women gaining more freedom, the aggressors feel as if they're losing control and react with more extreme violence," Victoria Rosell, head of the Spanish government's taskforce against gender violence, was cited by AFP as saying.

"In the case of the increasing numbers we've seen in recent months, we've seen how easing the restrictions has exposed another underlying pandemic, that of male violence."

In another European country, Belgium, 13 women have died from violence since the end of April compared with 24 in the whole of 2020. In France, 56 have been killed so far this year compared with 46 for the same period a year earlier, according to NGO data.