Sisters
at heart of Pope's World Peace Day Message on human trafficking
(Vatican Radio) ‘No longer slaves, but brothers and sisters’ is
the theme of the 2015 World Peace Day Message which was released at a press
conference in the Vatican on Wednesday. The Pope’s annual message is drawn up
with the help of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, but speakers at
the press conference this year also included sisters who have been pioneering
the Church’s battle against trafficking for the past two decades. Philippa
Hitchen reports……
Sisters on the front
line of the fight against modern slavery were guest speakers in the Vatican
press office, sharing their personal experience of working with trafficked
victims in Italy, India, Brazil, Nigeria and Costa Rica. They included Sr
Gabriella Bottani, the new head of the ‘Talitha Kum’ international network of
sisters against trafficking, who spoke of the particular role that Pope Francis
has highlighted for women working to raise awareness of this modern form of
slavery.
She noted that this
year’s message stresses the need for a widespread mobilisation of all people of
good will to combat this growing phenomenon, urging us not to turn away and
become accomplices to the suffering of our brothers and sisters. Also giving
first hand testimony of the work her sisters are doing to support victims and
prosecute the traffickers was Sr Sharmi D’Souza from India.
She
said the sisters go with the police on raids in the brothels and rescue the
girls, for example, in one raid, she said they rescued 37 girls, of whom 11
were working as underage prostitutes. From these girls, she said, they are able
to find out all the details of who the traffickers are and where they work, so
that her lawyer sisters have already helped to put 30 traffickers in jail.
Sr Sharmi also
appealed for the “bishops, priests and pastors” to stand with the sisters and
help them in the grass roots work they’re doing in so many countries around the
world. I asked the head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace,
Cardinal Peter Turkson how he can encourage more Church leaders to take up this
challenge?
He
said the Peace Day Messages are sent via the nuncios to bishops around the
world and he encouraged them to constitute study groups to respond to the call
of the message. If Christmas and New Year are not a good time to do this, he
said, choose another time of year – as India has done – to celebrate and raise
awareness around this theme.
In particular the
cardinal suggested the date of February 8th, feast day of the Sudanese slave
girl, Saint Josephine Bakhita which the Church has designated a day of prayer
for all victims of slavery and trafficking.
In the message Pope
Francis mentions so many ways in which people continue to be enslaved and
exploited today: in domestic or agricultural work, in the manufacturing or
mining industry, migrants living and working in inhuman conditions, child
soldiers, women forced into arranged marriages, and those trafficked for organ
transplants, drug smuggling, begging or other illegal activities. As well as
praising the “silent efforts” of so many religious to support and rehabilitate
the victims, the Pope also calls for “a shared commitment” by States,
businesses, intergovernmental organisations and individuals to “offer hope,
open doors” and help combat this crime against humanity.
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