ANNA'S STORY

Here is a short story from Dateline about a young Filipino woman. It is only a few minutes long, but it tells a little bit of how these girls are kidnapped and trapped, and how it is almost impossible for some to get help because of the corrupt law enforcement and government officials.



On a related topic, I would like to know why the hell a man, who was proved to have raped 7 Cambodian children, assaulted 3 Vancouver prostitutes and murdered one, only got 7 years in jail. Does that make anyone else what to puke. I don't even think 7 years is enough for the rape of one child, let alone 7.

THE UGLY IS COMING OUT

I never realized what an angry person I can be. Seeing all the evil in the world has brought out the worst in me. I just recently watched a Dateline special about the brothel raid in Cambodia led by Gary Haugen of International Justice Mission. I wanted to reach my hand through the screen, grab those pimps by the neck and strangle them.
It's worth checking out, you can watch the raid episode as well as the follow up they did a couple of years later here.

Personally I think one of the most effective ways of deterring... pimps (I hesitate to use the word because it has lost meaning and has become part of normal conversation, possibly even "cool", ie: shows like Pimp My Ride, or phrases like, "that's pimpin'")
would be to mechanically castrate them then hang them naked in the middle of the ultra red lights areas. I could never do that, but I am sure it would be effective. Currently, the only consequences they receive if they happen to run into a non-corrupt policeman is a few years in prison.

I have a really hard time feeling anything but anger towards these people, but the Lord is helping me to get over that. I don't think the anger is the problem. It is okay to be angry about injustice, God is. But it is more where that anger is directed and what you o with it. It is not to be directed at the Lord's creation, but at the source of evil. For some who is more in the "sin is a personal decision" not the "satan made me do it" camp this is hard.

The most helpful thing for me is that well known armor of God bit, which I believe is in Ephesians 6. I am willing to do spiritual battle, that is how I have to see this if I am to have any kind of love or compassion. I have to separate the creation form the spiritual source of evil. The whole "hate the sin love the sinner thing" is not so easy, it is not easy to seperate the two.

I was shocked when I discovered that many of these pimps themselves are just children, 14 and 15 years old. It's a family business in some cases with the parents teaching these kids to do this. What happened to these people to make them think this is okay? How is it that they can treat another human life so flippantly? The girls who are locked away in these dungeons have lost their childhood, but so have the 14 year olds boys who have been taught to sell human dignity and innocence.

I am getting closer to being able to say that I love these perverts, but I still have ways to go.

Imagine...

GETTING CLOSER

I think everything is coming together now. The first of a series of “ah ha” moments (most of which were “well duh” moments too), happened a couple of weeks ago.

I was pretty much consumed with fear and anger for about a month. I was terrified and mad that God might send me to witness to the men who torture and defile the young girls taken from their families. God never asked me too, didn’t even hint at it. All He said in the midst of my search for how to save these girls was,

“What about the ones committing the crimes?”

From that, I got thinking, "If I try to look at them like God does, what will He ask me to do next?"

That little bit of fear grew faster then Pseudomonas aeruginosa in an armpit lesion. I hid from God so that He couldn't ask me to do what I couldn't do (because I knew that with Him all things are possible). I wasn't willing to abandon my faith, but I wasn't ready to face the One in whom I have placed that faith. It became unbearable though, as I couldn't sleep at night, spent many nights crying, and just missed my Heavenly Father.

I finally decided that enough was enough. I went for a rather long walk, which seemed even longer in -25 degrees. Just as I was approaching home it hit me.

Fear and anger are not of God. There are righteous versions of both, but this did not apply to me. If they are not of God then that only leaves the enemy. I definitely did not want him to win. I don't know how to explain it, but I felt God being excited for me at this re-realization. I felt the burden lift and a new sense of freedom. I still didn't like the idea of what God might ask me to do, but I sure as hell wasn't going to let Satan have his way, and keep me from God.

DRUM ROLL PLEASE

Over the past couple of weeks, amidst my ridonculously busy life, I am as close as I ever have been to being here "I am Lord send me." About three months ago I thought I was there, I so desperatrly wanted to go wherever God would send to put an end to injustice. Then God challenged me by saying,

"What about the ones who commit these injustices?"

"Well, I want them burned at the stake."

Then God said "Try again."

That left me in a "Here I am send me. But..." And that doesn't really work. So I got angry and scared and hid. If I don't talk to You, You can't tell me to do something I don't want to do! But that also doesn't work. So the next phase was "Here I am." That consisted of prayers that went something like this,

Not a chance God. No way, I think not. Not me.
but...
Please don't give up on me.

That is where I was for about a couple weeks. But the last couple of weeks have been fabulous! Full of "Oh I see," and "Uh huh," and "Oh, right." I am still ironing out the kinks, but things are coming together and I am getting back to being able to say "Here I am Lord, send me."

THE REALITY

Here are a few things that I have read over the last month.

From Time magazine, "Nepal's Lost Daughters, 'India's Soiled Goods'

~"Depending on a girls beauty, she can fetch anywhere from... less than a water buffalo, slightly more than a video recorder"

~an 8 year old girls tells "I was so small. They gave me hormone injections so that I would grow breast faster. These injections hurt so, so much. When I tried to struggle, the madame beat me on the chest." and "A man came in, and they forced me to have sex with him. I fought, but there were five women from the house that pinned down my arms and legs." She is 13 and has HIV. She says "Men? I'd like to kill them, chop off their penises."


From OutlookIndia.com, "For Sale: Childhood"

~ about a girl first raped at 9 years old but sold as a slave much younger, "bought and sold several times a day. By at least 7 men daily." And, "She once fell sick because she had serviced to many customers. Then, her fragile face urging one to believe what she obviously thinks is the worst part of her story, she complains, 'Tara beat me a lot. Every time I felt to sick to work she beat me... At times I thought I would not be able to walk.'" She has TB, HIV and several other STD's.

~general statements about Nepali girls in Indian brothels, "Many not even 9 years old", "locked up for days, starved and beaten till they learn how to service up to 25 clients a day."
~ a 13 year old girl tells of another girls experience, "She was a scared little thing. Really tiny. She was thrashed until her nose bled. Then a man was sent into the room... Her screams had us shivering. She was torn apart, couldn't walk for weeks.

~"Some of the rescued girls... been through rigorous 'training' before being initiated into the flesh trade. Constant exposure to blue films, tutorials in how to 'please' customers and repeated rapes are part of the lessons."


Here is a picture from daughterscambodia.org, drawn by a 12 year old.
"My Life In a Brothel"(click photo to enlarge)

ANOTHER POST BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE LETTERS P, M, AND S

So in order to save gas and money I decided to take the bus to the youth centre. I figured out the bus, and it didn't look so bad, it was going to take twice as long to get there but I found a route with no transfers so it was okay. I had a couple of other options, but they had transfers and thus would take longer.
Here was the plan for the day, youth center to school (someone needed to copy my notes and I was going to study for a bit) then superstore then back home.

So I went and waited for the bus, arriving 10 minutes before it was supposed to get there. Half an hour later no bus. Then I saw this little old lady slip and fall on the ice. I went over to help her and during that time option number two pulled in and then drove away before I could get back to it. It is always great when you get jacked for doing something nice. Anyway, I waited another 1ominutes, and then option 3 came in so I hopped on that one. I wasn't sure when option 1 was going to come around and I didn't want to stand at the bus stop all day. This option took over an hour to get to where I wanted to be, but oh well.

I eventually made it to the centre only to find that it was closed. This dude almost never closes this place so something must have happened. I couldn't find the bus stop that went back the other direction so I walked back to downtown. Only about a 15 minute walk. It was an absolutely beautiful day, about 5 degrees on the positive side. Too bad I didn't know that when I first left because was wearing my winter coat, mitts and a scarf. I was also carrying a backpack full of books that I had brought for the kids at the centre and the textbooks I needed to study with later. It must have weighed at least 30 pounds. And I carried a bag full of craft stuff in my hand.

At the downtown terminal I hop on the bus to get to uni. The bus was nearly empty. I sat in a seat that was a little bigger than normal seats because it faced the side of the bus not the front. And I had put my backpack beside me, thankful to give my back a break. At the next stop some crazy lady gets on and of all the places she could sit guess where she sat... yup, right beside me. I knew she was going to sit there, so I looked the other way trying to hide my smile and discussing with God how I was not sharing his sense of humor at the moment.

"Excuse me. Excuse me" She said.

"Yes" I replied, wondering what she wanted. She just kept yelling "Excuse me" and I didn't know what she was talking about. I thought it was one of those "Excuse me" type things you say when you want to ask somebody the time or something. It couldn't possibly be a move out of my way "excuse me". She was a large women and I thought she would have chosen a larger seat with nobody sitting on it. But no. She was carrying a small bag of groceries, looked like bread and eggs.

She sat down beside me, still yelling excuse me, and I was still wondering what the heck was going on. Then she pushed my backpack into squishing me in the seat so that I hat to sit on my side. I was so squished I didn't think I would be able to squeeze out. Then she places her small, and also light weight bag in the nice space she cleared on the seat while I am crammed.

I don't know what happened but a few minutes later she drops the JC profanity and glares at some other stranger on the bus not even within arms reach of her so I don't know what that was about. I then received a sympathetic look of understanding from another passenger and then we both started to chuckle a little bit.

I get to the uni and wait for the person I was supposed to meet to give him my notes. Meeting time 3:30. By 3:40 I decided to leave. This was the third time he didn't show up so I left. Just as I was leaving the uni he showed up and I wanted to be a jerk and tell him I didn't have time, but I couldn't. So we walked back to the library photocopy centre. I thought he was just missing one or two days from last semester. I gave him my binder. He proceeded to take all of November out. What the h***? You gotta be kidding me. First of all, this is going to take forever. Secondly, it's one thing to miss one or two classes, but to skip an entire month? Now I am a little pissed. I think he sensed it. He started giving some big excuse about it was such a hard month because he had so many midterms, blah blah blah. "You know what? Me too, in fact I probably had more than you because I am taking 6 classes, and I work and I do volunteer work, but I still go to class." I would have liked to say that, but no, instead I said, "No probem". Then to make my time at the university complete I walked into the bathroom and found a used condom on the floor. Sick!

The blessings of the day continued, but this is a really long post already so I will say goodnight.

???

I am trying to work through things in little baby steps here. Well actually I have been finding convenient ways of avoiding and slowing down the process of accepting what God is trying to tell me. A convenient, but important, delay tactic has been asking questions. Here are some that have come up as I try to come to terms with this loving/witnessing to perverts who rape and sell children.

How do I know if I love them? Love is tangible when people are around you, but this is a group of people that are impersonal to and far away from me.

Can you love someone and still want them to be burned at that stake? Okay, okay, not burned, but at least punished for what they are doing? Jail maybe?

Is there room in God's justice for our criminal justice system?

As a Christian is it okay for me to want them to be put in prison for what they have done, even if they have repented and turned to God?

Right now I am having difficulty accepting the new covenant. I want an eye for an eye, although I realize their are implications for myself under the old system of the Law. This is quite distressing for me. You don't get to chose when you will follow God, and when you will not. You can't pick and choose which rules you want to follow, well I suppose you could but then it wouldn't really be Christianity. Scripture says much about giving your life to God, "giving yourself as a living sacrifice", so this is a big deal if I can't get though this and accept what God is saying. If you are lukewarm He will spit you out, it's an all or nothing deal. So if I can't do "all", then that only leaves one option. I am not throwing in the towel, I am fighting, but I am getting tired. And no one seems to understand how hard this is and how much I want to help the victims not the offenders.

SIDE NOTE: TIMES HAVE CHANGED

Just a short little aside to the usual things I post on my blog.

Things have changed a lot in our society. Things are always changing, I know, but every once and a while I see something that reminds of the way things used to be.

During the break I was back at home where there was cable tv. I was lucky enough to catch a "Fresh Prince of Bel Air" marathon. In one of the episodes, Ashley, Will's 16 year old cousin is on a date. Earlier in the episode, she had told her friends that it might be "the night". On this date her and her boyfriend take a drive and end up looking over some cliff thing, and they are just talking. It comes out that Ashley thought this would be "the night" since her boyfriend was moving away. They have this awkward "Are you ready", "Uh, well are you ready" scene. They go back and forth like this a bit and then Ashleys says that she is not ready to have sex yet. And I was shocked, but also pleased when the audience all cheered. I don't know if it was a real audience or not, but the point they were making was that it was a good thing not to have sex. Now I don't have time to watch much tv, but in the bits that I see and hear about it seems like not having sex isn't even an option anymore. The Fresh Prince isn't even that old. Perhaps, if we are lucky, history will repeat itself and we can go back to the time when children had a mother and a father, and a girl getting pregnant at 13 was unheard of.

Another pleasantly surpirsing moment for me occurred while watching "The Jungle Book". Bagheera, the panther, says "There is no love greater than this, that a man lays down his life for a friend." It made my night.