Human Trafficking

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Advent, Family, Holidays, Human Trafficking, Kids at Risk, The Lighthouse Project, Third Culture Kids -

Christmas in El Salvador is always so much fun, and this year was no exception! There is a lot of joy to be found in bringing laughter, joy, and hope to those who feel disconnected from family and community during the holidays. We are grateful that we had the opportunity to step in and minister to our clients who may otherwise feel alone during the Christmas season. We want to say a big thanks to our donors for helping to make our Christmas celebrations happen this year! We gave gifts and threw parties for all the survivors that we work with, we had a huge party in the CISNA boys’ center, and we had our annual Christmas Eve party where we invited all of our clients off the streets and […]

Our Girls

Free the Girls, Gangs, Human Trafficking, Immigration, Kids at Risk -

Yesterday marked the International Day of the Girl. It’s a day to focus on girls, and issues that they are facing around the world. It’s easy to see girls as vulnerable and in need of protection but we can also see them as powerful members of their communities. Research tells us that when girls are educated, their whole communities are impacted. We can acknowledge the challenges, but also celebrate the victories. Here in El Salvador, girls are facing overwhelming obstacles. Many of the girls we work with have experienced the very worst that life has to offer in the very short time that they have been on this earth. Some have been trafficked, others abused and neglected. Many of them live in fear. The situation created by gangs and poverty […]

The Ripple Effect

Free the Girls, Gangs, Human Trafficking, Immigration, Justice, Kids at Risk, Urban Ministry -

When you drop a stone into a pond there is an initial plunk and then the splash of water. Around the place where the stone dropped ripples spread out until the calm, quiet of the pond is completely interrupted by ripples of various sizes. No part of it is left untouched. I am seeing that violence has a similar affect on society, at least on the society here in El Salvador. Our tiny home has made international news for the worst possible reason…a soaring homicide rate. August closed with more than 900 murders. That is in a country the size of Massachusetts. As the ripples of violence spread, lives are marked by terror and fear. Some of the women who sell bras in our Free The Girls program can no […]

Imagine

Free the Girls, Gangs, Human Trafficking, Justice, Prayer, Urban Ministry -

Courage and strength…these qualities can be hard to come by when we grow up in the best of environments. Now, imagine that you did not grow up in a healthy environment. Imagine that you grew up in a hard situation, that your mother was gone most nights prostituting herself, that your father wasn’t around, and that your siblings didn’t even have the same father as you. Imagine that gangs moved into your neighborhood and forced you to do things you didn’t want to do. Imagine that you were exploited, intimidated, and soon you were in so deep that there was no way out. Imagine that you went to jail, and had a baby there. Imagine the fear, the weakness, the uncertainty. Imagine that you don’t have to imagine any of this […]

Love Like A Gangster

Free the Girls, Gangs, Holidays, Human Trafficking, Urban Ministry -

In El Salvador, Valentine’s Day is called “Love and Friendship Day” and last month we celebrated love and friendship with all of the women involved in the Free The Girls program here in El Salvador. My mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and niece were visiting so they helped serve, and a group of women in the States that pray regularly for the girls helped to sponsor the party. We had pizza and candy, a raffle, and a discussion about love. The reality is that these women have received some very mixed-up messages about love. Sex is very distorted in their minds, and abuse and manipulation by “boyfriends” have further confused any notion of romance, love, and affection for them. Part of my work with them is addressing the lies about what love is […]

At Risk

Gangs, Human Trafficking, Immigration, Justice, Kids at Risk, Prayer, The Lighthouse Project, Urban Ministry -

Risk. It’s a word that we hear thrown around in conversation. “Don’t risk it.” “Take a risk.” “At your own risk.” Sometimes the thought of a risk seems thrilling, exciting, on the edge. Other times it seems foolish and like something best avoided. We do a lot of things to take the risk factor right out of our lives. We live in homes with doors that lock, and drive cars with airbags and seat belts. We make choices about our health, our bodies, and what we put into them. We wear sunblock, and floss our teeth to lower our risks, to extend our lives, and to avoid sickness and pain. But what if you were born “at risk?” What if you stepped out of a warm, safe place and in […]

Free The Girls Christmas in El Salvador

Advent, Free the Girls, Holidays, Human Trafficking -

This past year was one of new opportunities, and personal growth for women involved in the Free The Girls program here at MTES. We continue to be grateful to FTG for partnering with us and enabling us to serve these women that we love and respect. Our girls worked hard in El Salvador this year. For some it has been a year of personal struggle, for others a year of victory. We took some time the week before Christmas to celebrate all of these amazing survivors and to dream together about 2015. We had a guest speaker from Pittsburgh share with us about her own painful past, and the beauty that God has brought from it. Many of the women had tears streaming down their faces as they listened to […]

A Third Too Many

Free the Girls, Human Trafficking, Immigration, Justice, Kids at Risk -

This weekend our newspaper reported a sobering and disturbing statistic about girls in El Salvador. At latest count, thirty percent of all pregnancies in El Salvador are to girls under the age of 15. That is roughly 1 out of every 3. The text under the headline reported that many of the cases are rapes. You can read the report in Spanish here. This is terrible news for girls. The reality is that girls in El Salvador are in crisis. They are vulnerable to rape, abuse, and trafficking. These girls leave school and enter a cycle of poverty that is virtually impossible to break.  A third of all pregnancies to girls under 15 is a third too many. Unfortunately the news isn’t much better for boys. Tori had to do […]

Something to Celebrate

Free the Girls, Human Trafficking, Justice, Kids at Risk -

Yesterday we had a beautiful celebration for our three Quinceañeras (15 year old girls). In this culture, turning 15 is a big deal and communities and churches join together to celebrate the life of the girl turning 15. In many cases, whole communities pitch in to sponsor different parts of the fiesta…a friend may sponsor some of the food, a family member may pay for balloons, a neighbor might provide plates and silverware. When we heard that three of the young survivors we work with would be 15 all in the same timeframe, we knew that we had to celebrate! It was an amazing thing for us to see our donors both in the U.S. and in El Salvador surround these girls with love and form a community of support for them […]

Party Time!

Free the Girls, Fundraising, Human Trafficking, Kids at Risk -

Part of our work in El Salvador includes offering resources to women and girls who are human trafficking survivors. We have several initiatives to serve them and to help them build a better future. We recently discovered that several of the girls we work with will be turning 15 all within the same timeframe and so we’ve decided that it’s time to party! Turning 15 is a really big deal in El Salvador and a 15th birthday celebration is called a Quinceañera.  For many girls in El Salvador (and throughout Latin America), turning 15 is a much bigger party then even a wedding celebration. These girls who have survived the horror of human trafficking have no family or community to celebrate this important moment in their lives. We want to do […]

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