On 9 September 2025, the eightieth session of the UN General Assembly (UNGA80) was opened by its new President Annalena Baerbock—the fifth woman to hold such a position. President Baerbock also led a High-Level Conference on the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women on 22 September 2025. At this commemorative event, various Heads of States and Governments recommitted to advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment despite the challenges to global pushback. The global intergovernmental body dedicated to gender equality and women’s empowerment and has a role to play in following up with these commitments is the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

The revitalization of the CSW was mandated in the Pact for the Future adopted in September 2024. In response to the CSW revitalization, the Gender Working Group of the Multifaith Advisory Council (MFAC) held a hybrid roundtable discussion during UNGA80, titled “Side by Side: Connecting Sacred Dialogue and Responses in Promoting Gender Equality,” on 25 September 2025. Its Policy Brief launched the same day. MFAC developed the brief by analyzing the oral and written statements submitted for the sixty-ninth session of the CSW and intended to provide faith-based insights, language and strategies to counter harmful narratives and offer concrete collective actions. It was created as a resource to offer positive narratives as an alternative to the anti-rights and anti-gender rhetoric being heard increasingly at the UN and globally. In fact, a report by UN Women, “Women’s Rights in Review 30 Years After Beijing,” documents that, in 2024, “Almost one quarter of countries reported that backlash on gender equality is hampering implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action.” Gender discrimination continues to be embedded in social and economic structures, which hinders progress on gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Lopa Banerjee, Director of the Civil Society Division of UN Women, and Mariarosa Cutillo, Chief of the Private Sector and Civil Society Branch of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), gave High-Level Opening Remarks at the roundtable event, reiterating the timely importance of the MFAC brief. Banerjee stated, “Gender equality is not an ideology; it is the foundation of peace, equality and human rights.” As a roundtable speaker, Ivy Koek of SGI emphasized the need to unite around common messaging among faiths and secular women’s and feminist organizations, despite its challenges. Other faiths represented at the roundtable included Sikhism, Judaism, the Baha’i Faith, Christianity, Hinduism and Islam. Reflections from the wider feminist movement were given by Paola Salwan Daher, Senior Director for Collective Action of Women Deliver, who shared how they are using their convening power to advance women’s rights and launching a Feminist Playbook at their conference in April 2026 in Melbourne, Australia.