The Road to Slavery. The Way to Freedom.

Each trafficked child’s story is unique. Yet there are certain common themes amongst them.

Poverty
Sometimes a girl is trafficked because of her parents’ extreme poverty. Desperate people make desperate choices. And some of these desperate choices result in children being trafficked.

Ignorance
Often recruiters visit villages and approach unwary parents with glowing stories promising a better life. Tales of rich patrons needing young nannies or incredible job prospects awaiting in large cities are spun before unsuspecting parents. Their shortcoming is gullibility, so they put their mark on the dotted line and accept the “earnest” money offered as down payment. Then they naïvely surrender their daughters to the traffickers, sometimes never to see or hear from them again.

Greed
Stephen King writes, “Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.” Unfit parents exist the world over. And some have concluded that the lives of their children are only worth the commerce to be made off them. So they sell their children to traffickers. And sometimes, they even pimp out their children themselves.

William Wilberforce, the great abolitionist of the early 19th century, understood correctly that the heart of the matter is the matter of the heart. He wrote, “God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the slave trade and the reformation of manners.” He wasn’t talking about common etiquette. He was talking about how people live.

Hearts must be changed to protect children. Hearts must be changed to rescue children. And hearts must be changed to help them to remain free. There is no greater power to change the lives of men and women than God and the light of His truth.

Once a child is removed from her family, the perpetrator often confiscates her identification papers and takes her to another, perhaps even foreign, location. There the girl may be drugged, forced into brothels, prostitution, pornography, and menial servitude. Often the child is beaten, raped, and locked up with little hope of escape.

Rapha House works to reach these vulnerable children and offer them freedom, hope, and healing. Our staff, volunteers and an entire army of compassionate donors come together to end this exploitation of children.

Be a freedom fighter. Countless children are still longing to be free. Make a difference to a child.

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