Recently, I was delighted to see that one of Bombay's evening papers, The Afternoon Despatch and Courier, was carrying an extra edition called "Woman's Extra." For two weeks, they profiled twelve women: six international figures, and six national ones. The series was partly biographical, but it was also a celebration of the women's accomplishments. As this extra edition shows, there's a growing recognition that women have something to offer—something that goes deeper than the excellence these particular women are exhibiting in their areas of expertise.
I believe this "something" is the best of feminity, the qualities of gentleness, purity, love, discernment, and so on. In a world where masculine qualities such as strength and courage have long been celebrated, it's wonderful to see this acknowledgment of the value of womanhood. The qualities often associated with women aren't simply a nice addition to the qualities exhibited by their male counterparts. They're essential ingredients for a productive, peaceful, wellfunctioning world. The chairman of the Times of India once remarked that unless women come forward, the world will never attain peace. To me, this shows a growing awareness of the need for that balance between power and humility—or, in other terms, the balance between the masculine and the feminine.
In my prayers for the women of India and of the world, I love to focus on this idea of balance. In Genesis the Bible says, "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." Gen. 1 :27. To me this means that balance is a natural part of God's creation, that the masculine cannot exist without the feminine, and vice versa. To be made in God's image, then, is to live as the expression of courage and humility, of intelligence and intuition. Seeing creation in this perfect balance shifts the recent focus on women from a societal or cultural trend to a natural, spiritual progression.
