From 11-19 March 2025, my colleague Zsuzsánna Bartha from Kocsord, Hungary, and I participated in the Spring Seminar in New York, organized by ICUUW, which was timed to coincide with the annual conference of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).
This year, CSW celebrated the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (in 1995, 189 countries committed themselves to promoting gender equality at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing), so the main objective of this year's conference was to look back and take account of the achievements and failures. The presentations and workshops during the two-week session focused on how gender equality has been achieved over the past 30 years and where little or no progress has been made on this matter. Almost 800 presentations and workshops took place in different venues in parallel to the Commission's official session. We followed these through an app as we tried to navigate the rich offer. In these workshops, non-profit organizations from around the world presented projects that sought solutions to challenges such as violence against women, women's access to education, healthcare, the labor market, as well as equal pay for women.
The Spring Seminar was held in the impressive church of the Fourth Universalist Society, across from New York's famous Central Park. Built in the 19th century, the beautiful church is almost lost in the shadow of the skyscrapers, yet it proclaims the presence of a Unitarian Universalist denomination in the city's diverse landscape. The two-day meeting also included short presentations and small group discussions on the main theme: an introduction to and around UN institutions, programs, Agenda30 (Sustainable Development Goals) and the role of ICUUW in promoting the UN's goals within Unitarian communities. The workshop also provided an opportunity for networking, one-to-one conversations, discussion of common goals, and reflection on the future of ICUUW.
A highlight of the day was the short commemoration at the Kossuth statue on the afternoon of March15. This was a special national holiday for the two of us, and our Hungarian Unitarian brother Gábor Kiss, who lives in New Jersey, joined the group, so the three of us sang the Kossuth song at the feet of the statue. We then visited a Hungarian pastry shop in New York and were delighted to find that the shop and Hungarian pastries are very popular among Americans.
In addition to the conference and spring workshop programs, we also participated in events at All Souls, the largest Unitarian Universalist congregation in New York. One was a joint event organized by the All Souls Women's Alliance, with a presentation on the ICUUW’s Fourth Convocation in September in Kolozsvár/Cluj-Napoca.
In addition to the side programs, we also took time to visit some of the sights of New York. The Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, Central Park, Rockefeller Square, Grand Central Station, the 9/11 Memorial, Trinity Church, the New York Public Library and the unmissable Times Square were all on display in the glorious sunshine. Walking between them, but rather hurrying, we had the feeling that the sun was shining through the skyscrapers in New York. For making our short but very meaningful trip to the US possible, we are grateful for the support we received from ICUUW, the Ferenc Balázs Scholarship Committee, the Hungarian Unitarian Church, and our Unitarian sister Karen Steele, who welcomed us into her home while we were there. We thank UNOSZ for the gifts we were able to give to the workshop participants.