I've crossed paths with people pioneering a brand new non-profit called Generate Hope that's confronting the grim reality of sex-trafficking in San Diego. Here's a glimpse into a little-known aspect of this sunny city, from an interview as their first women's safehouse opened last week.
There's not much commentary for me to add... I am grateful for organizations like this one offering aid for a gaping need. I feel strongly about the Church's responsibility to step up in the face of grim, stark realities like this. I reflect on yesterday's sermon on Jonah, in which the preacher firmly argued that, "Our disobedience is the world's catastrophe." Our failure-- and even refusal-- as the Church to engage a society that craves power, exploitation and literally cheap sex is disobedience. And it is catastrophe. Every individual actor in the sex trade screams for love, for ministry, for the light of Jesus. Of course we feel compassion for the women entering recovery. But what about the larger, frightening, disgusting system? Are some of them our Ninevites? The johns, the pimps, the gangs, the accomplices, the abusers who made that little girl feel unsafe? Imagine a world in which THEY were healed as well. Imagine a world where that resounding catastrophe could be replaced by hope.
It's a miracle, but one we've seen before: out of dark, wounded, belly-of-a-whale depths, hope comes.