Injustice for One is Injustice for All

"We are bound by an inescapable garment of mutuality, whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." -Dr. Martin Luther King, jr.

- letter from the Birmingham Jail, 1962

This week, we are remembering the legacy of civil rights and equality that Rosa Parks, a tremendous woman of courage, left our nation and world. Yet, there are still tens if not hundreds of thousands of women and children who exist in slavery- today in 2005, nearly 150 years after the emancipation proclamation, and 75 years after women gained the right to vote.

This past Saturday, I watched a show on a television network that I have fastidiously avoided in the past- Lifetime. Yes, a man watching a show on Lifetime- Television for Women...so much for my thin macho veneer...

It was a powerfully moving program called "Human Trafficking." The program, which is based on the alarming trend of young women from Asia, Eastern Europe, and even (gasp), here from the United States, being abducted and sold into the sex slavery and pornography industries.

The docudrama begins with a handful of teenage girls responding either to ads promising modeling jobs or mail order marriages. Then once they respond and get on the plane to America, Mexico, Austria or another location, they meet a contact and are wisked away in a van, have their passports, money and belongings taken from them, and are held forcibly against their will. They are then subjected to physical and mental abuse, rape, and forced into prostitution.

In another case, young girls traveling with their families in Southeast Asia were abducted in crowded marketplaces and sold into sex slavery- many became victims of so-called "sex tourists"- sick men who travel from the U.S. and Europe to engage in disgusting sexual abuse of minors. It is shocking and absolutely abominable, but happens on a disturbingly wider and wider scale. Estimates are that this illegal sex slavery reaps billions in profits each year for the heartless evil individuals running crime organizations that propagate this trade in human flesh.

Even sadder, affluent American and European men are the primary supporters of this illicit and dehumanizing trade.

We must all take a united stand against this dehumanizing injustice! We must pressure our congressional representatives to strengthen enforcement, we must also support grassroots advocacy for supporting women and children who are trying to get out and make a fresh start. "Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly," as Martin Luther King, jr. said, very eloquently during the Civil Rights Movement, nearly 50 years ago.

Jesus, also said in the Gospel "As you have done to the least of these, you have also done to me."

Are we willing to step beyond our comfort zones of American apathy and stand for justice for all?

I hope so. Let's begin today- together we can make a difference.

Peace for all,

John