Stop Child Trafficking event

Today was the event that we (mostly DH) have worked so hard to get ready for. Hours and hours of stage building, tearing down, moving, setting up again...setting up sound systems and toiling hours and hours in the sun.

I have to say that it was all worth it. I know that Dh would agree.

I must admit that I am feeling a bit raw tonight. I was shamefully unaware of the far reaches of the problem of child sex trafficking in the world and in our very own backyard. I had no idea. I am finding myself getting angry as I think about it. There is so much I did not know. I probably did not want to know.

It is easier for me to sit in my home baking and fretting over the insignificant cares of my world, caught up in my own issues than to think of a room full of girls in Thailand.. ages 8 and up with numbers around their necks...waiting night after night to be sold over and over to white travelers from the U.S.

It is easier for me to get wrapped up in the "serious" debates on head coverings, dresses vs. pants or the "right" homeschool curriculum than it is for me to think about innocent children, stolen from their homes...or worse yet, sold by their parents to pimps to walk the red light districts the world over. Girls and young women who are hooked on drugs to make them more controllable. Girls who are as young as 8.

Tonight, more than 5,000 children will be forced into a room with a stranger for the first time where they will experience horrors that no child should ever have to endure.
How about these stats?

300,000 children in the U.S. are at risk every year for commercial sexual exploitation. -U.S. Department of Justice

600,000 – 800,000 people are bought and sold across international borders each year; 50% are children, most are female. The majority of these victims are forced into the commercial sex trade. – U.S. Department of State, 2004, Trafficking in Persons Report, Washington, D.C.

An estimated 14,500 to 17,500 foreign nationals are trafficked into the United States each year. The number of U.S. citizens trafficked within the country is even higher, with an estimated 200,000 American children at risk for trafficking into the sex industry. – U.S Department of Justice Report to Congress from Attorney General John Ashcroft on U.S. Government Efforts to Combat Trafficking in Persons

There are open sex slavery cases in all 50 States. An estimated 10,000 sex slaves exist in New York City. – Red Light Children Campaign

An estimated 2.5 million children, the majority of them girls, are sexually exploited in the multi billion dollar commercial sex industry – UNICEF

Investigators and researchers estimate the average predator in the U.S. can make more than $200,000 a year off one young girl. – NBC Report by Teri Williams

I was particularly moved by what one of the speakers (Phil Manginelli) said. I don't have the exact quote, but it was something like this....How can we call ourselves lovers of Jesus and not be stirred by the things that move him?

I agree totally. The church has been deceived into pouring all their mental energy into legalistic pursuits and arguments on what color to paint the sanctuary. We have had our gaze drawn away to insignificant issues, non salvation issues that we will condemn each other with ruthlessly.

Issues of what we wear, what we eat and drink or what music we listen to for pity sake. We have been deceived by a slight of hand. We are raptly staring at the sleeve to see if indeed there is nothing up there...all the while, the great enemy of our souls is pulling the wool over our eyes concerning the real issues.

If he can get us to bite and devour each other, to judge and to hide away from the world and the precious lost souls dying all around us every day... in an attempt to not corrupt ourselves by those same precious souls) then children will continue to be sold onto slavery of the most heinous kind. Drug addicts and alcoholics will continue to sleep on the sidewalks in front of our coffee shops and people will continue to abuse and debase each other the world over.

It is time to pray and do the things that are not easy. I know, no one wants to think of child prostitution it is an ugly, uncomfortable topic that does not fit into our ordered lives...no one want to think about these children...but millions are...the pedophiles are thinking about them, the pimps and traffickers are thinking about them. You know what? Jesus is thinking about them and it is time that we did as well.
We can at least start there.