The Reality of Sexual Exploitation (City in Focus Event)

Work matters to God and is an important part of God’s created order. We are created to work and be stewards of God’s creation.  However, we need to be reminded that while the Kingdom of God is inaugurated here on earth, we still live in a world that is corrupted.  That is the tension we experience in the now but not yet.  Work can also corrupt and be corrupted. Today’s post is a stark reminder of why Christ Followers need to be salt and light in the world.  God calls us all to join Him in the redemptive work and to transform our cultures and society for His glory.

May 26, 2017 - Vancouver Club - City in Focus Event: Human Trafficking

Post also available at City in Focus Blog: http://www.cityinfocus.ca/2017/06/02/the-reality-of-sexual-exploitation/

Picture a full bus load of men coming to Vancouver.  And instead of going on a cruise together or sight-seeing, they come to Vancouver to buy sex from exploited women and children.

That was the essence of a comment made by one of the attendees in a conversation I had after the breakfast talk on Human Trafficking hosted by City in Focus last Friday.  

On the panel that morning was Cathy Peters (International Anti-Human Trafficking Advocate), Phil Reilly (Director of Development and Mobilization for IJM, BC), Sister Nancy Brown (Covenant House), and Gwendoline Allison (Foy Allison Law).  The discussion was mediated by Tom Cooper.

Surely human trafficking cannot be that big of a problem here in our beautiful city? We would be naïve to believe that the ads in the local newspapers for nail parlors, escorts and massage services are what they advertise.  Those are the services that publicly advertised; with the emergence of the Internet, many of those services have gone underground.  

Some other comments from the morning:

• 20% of the prostitutes (women and men) are from the streets, and 80% from the Internet. 
• 50% of those women are aboriginals.  
• Globally, the sex industry accounts for $120-150 Billion USD which affects approximately 2 million children who are exploited for profit.   
• Vancouver is the largest Sugar Daddy city.  
• There is a child pornography problem right in the city.
• Canada has the top 3 sites for hosting material for cyber sex trafficking.

With sex trafficking affecting so many people and of such big magnitude, why is there so little being said by our media?  It’s not difficult to deduce why.

The solution is not easy nor simple. It is multi-faceted and complex.  As our panelists pointed out, “Without addressing the demand for buying sex, we cannot hope to reduce the supply of victimized people.”  The way forward does begin locally, here in our city.  Change begins with raising awareness, increased enforcement and improved laws, education, and the pulpit.  

Need for greater awareness.  Without reports to the police, the crime hasn’t been committed; that is one of the reasons why media doesn’t talk about it.  To simply advocate that the victims go to police and report the problem is also to dismiss the emotions especially fears of a each person who are traumatized by their perpetrators.  Our society has turned prostitution into a choice–a choice of work or choice of the individual.  However, if you are poor–it is neither a choice nor is it work.  We need to name it for what it is–exploitation.

There is also a need for increased police involvement and enforcement of the law.  This will obviously require the review of our existing laws around the selling of sex and buyers of sex. It was troubling to hear a comment made during the session that the police often are not (and cannot be?) involved unless a girl goes missing, or has died from an incident.  In Vancouver, there is yet to be a someone charged for the crime.   The directive to take action needs to come from the top levels of our government and lead by the leaders of our city and police.  More, we need funding and programs to help trafficked individuals transition out of prostitution.  

There needs to be improved education.  Some of the girls that are lured into the sex industry are girls; Under aged girls who are too young and naïve to realize what is actually happening.  Trafficking of boys and girls are typically for labour or sex.  This is Vancouver I’m talking about.  Some girls from other countries are lured into the industry with the false promise of better education in Canada.  The poor are being exploited.  Education of our children needs to happen at an early age.  And it needs to begin in our homes; At the core, it’s about helping them understand their value as persons as well as educating them on the dignity of all humans and that all human life needs to be respected.

Lastly, something must change in our local churches.  The Church needs to be at the forefront of the battle in what Cathy Peters summarized as a “fight against evil.”   In other words, the weekly message from the pulpits needs to change. When we are Pro-Life, we need to be concerned about the entire life and all stages of the individual’s life–”from Womb to Tomb” as Tom Cooper exhorted. We need a renewed understanding of who we are as persons made in the image of God.  People, in particular women and children, cannot be equal if they are treated as objects–objects that can be consumed or bought and sold as commodity.  All people are precious in the heart of God.  If the Christian message is simply about being saved and going to Heaven after we die, we are perpetuating the problem.  If the Christian message is about shalom, justice, compassion, love, kindness, rescue and restoration–we, as the Body of Christ, need to take action today to live out what we in fact believe in.  This is a calling to the whole people of God, and we need to work together NOW.

“Having heard of all of this you may choose to look the other way but you can never again say that you did not know.” - William Wilberforce 

I Stand Near the Door - Rev. Samuel Moor Shoemaker

Rev.Samuel Shoemaker (1893-1963) was the rector at Calvary Episcopal Church in New York and co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. 

The Poem "So I Stay Near the Door-An Apologia for my life" known better as "So I Stand by the Door" written by Shoemaker in 1958 highlights his motto for ministry.  This poem acts as a daily reminder of what it means to "incarnate Christ" to my neighbors--'tis also my place to "stay near the door."

I stay near the door.I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out,The door is the most important door in the world—It is the door through which people walk when they find God.There’s no use my going way inside, and staying there,When so many are still outside, and they, as much as I,Crave to know where the door is.And all that so many ever find is only the wall where a door ought to be.They creep along the wall like [the blind].With outstretched, groping hands,Feeling for a door, knowing there must be a door,Yet they never find it . . .So I stay near the door.

The most tremendous thing in the worldIs for [people] to find that door—the door to God.The most important thing any [person] can doIs to take hold of one of those blind, groping hands,And put it on the latch—the latch that only clicksAnd opens to the [person's] own touch.[People] die outside that door, as starving beggars dieOn cold nights in cruel cities in the dead of winter—Die for want of what is within their grasp.They live, on the other side of it—live because they have found it.Nothing else matters compared to helping them find it,And open it, and walk in, and find Him . . .So I stay near the door.

Go in, great saints, go all the way in—Go way down into the cavernous cellars,And way up into the spacious attics—In a vast, roomy house, this house where God is.Go into the deepest of hidden casements,Of withdrawal, of silence, of sainthood.Some must inhabit those inner rooms,And know the depths and heights of God,And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.Sometimes I take a deeper look in,Sometimes venture a little farther;But my place seems closer to the opening . . .So I stay near the door.

The people too far in do not see how near these areTo leaving—preoccupied with the wonder of it all.Somebody must watch for those who have entered the door,But would like to run away. So for them, too,I stay near the door.

I admire the people who go way in.But I wish they would not forget how it wasBefore they got in. Then they would be able to helpThe people who have not even found the door,Or the people who want to run away again from God.You can go in too deeply, and stay in too long,And forget the people outside the door.As for me, I shall take my old accustomed place,Near enough to God to hear Him, and know He is there,But not so far from men as not to hear them,And remember they are there too.Where? Outside the door—Thousands of them, millions of them.But—more important for me—One of them, two of them, ten of them,Whose hands I am intended to put on the latch,So I shall stay by the door and waitFor those who seek it. ‘I had rather be a door-keeper . . .’So I stay near the door.

(source: http://dickb-blog.com/samshoemaker3.html)