This Must Not Stand

I went to a Presbytery meeting last night, we approved the operating budget, and did some other pretty normal stuff.  We also recognized an award given by the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship to a member of one of the churches in our Presbytery, Evelyn Chumbow.  As you might guess by the last name, Evelyn is from Africa, Cameroon specifically.  She is enthusiastic and easy to like, and she has a story that everyone needs to hear.
At nine years old Evelyn was sold into slavery by her Uncle.  She was purchased for the grand total of $2000 by a wealthy woman who was from Cameroon, but who was working in the United States for Lockheed Martin.  She was not initially aware of what was happening, and there is some question as to whether the Uncle really understood what was going on either.  Her family seemed to think that this was some sort of opportunity for her to go to America, be educated here, work hard and achieve the American Dream.  It did not turn out to be the case.
She became, as so many Africans before her, a slave, bought and paid for, in 1994.  She was kept out of school and away from anything like freedom, in Silver Spring Maryland.  She became a domestic servant of the wealthy woman who she only calls "her trafficker." She cooked, she cleaned, she cared for younger children.  When she did not please her mistress, she was stripped and whipped with a cable, she was constantly told that she was ugly and stupid and that she was worth nothing and that nobody cared about her.  She remained in that situation for over seven years before she finally escaped with the help of a cousin who had also been sold to the same trafficker.  They found family that lived here and the slavery ended, but now she was an undocumented immigrant, and her family wasn't quite sure how to proceed without putting the now 17 year old girl in the hands of the authorities.  There are laws to protect victims of human trafficking, but they are a work in progress, fifteen years ago, they were even more "in progress."
Around the world, by some estimates (and estimates are really all we have about this tragedy) there are over 12 million people in some form of slavery.  This is a pretty helpful infographic from the Department of Homeland Security that tells you about the problem.  According historical records, this is over 10 times the number of slaves held in the Antebellum United States (granted that was only one country and the 12 million figure is worldwide).  However, unlike in the period before the Civil war, where the number of slaves was capable of being measured somewhat more precisely, the numbers of total human beings being trafficked, here and around the world, is really just a guess, and probably on the low end.
When you hear stories of survivors like Evelyn, and you should, if you have the opportunity, sit and hear someone like her tell her story, you realize that this problem is massive and heartbreaking.  It preys on the vulnerable, on poor children who think they are being given a chance at something better. It is fueled by money and ignored by legal systems in many parts of the world.  People with enough resources can manage ways around the enforcement procedures and they forever and always wield fear as a weapon.
Evelyn escaped, she is now thirty, married with a three year old son.  She got that American education that she wanted so much, but it came the long, hard way around.  She has decided to use her voice to speak for those who are still trapped, trafficked and enslaved.  She came and sat in a circle of Presbyterians and told us her story.  She revisited the horrors of a little girl who became someone's property, the beatings, the insults, the hopeless feeling of being intentionally de-humanized, and she did so without crying.
When they gave her the little plaque and the certificate for her work, she did cry though, because she, as a survivor, was seen, and recognized.  I can't even imagine what sort of emotional processes one would go through to go from being a slave to being applauded by two hundred people at a Presbytery meeting because you simply have the courage to tell about the horror.
This horror can happen in your neighborhood. This horror is visited on too many.  This must not stand. There are people who are trying to help, some of them were there last night in our little circle, listening to Evelyn.  This is a link to one of them:
End Slavery Now
This is another:
Courtney's House
And here is more about Evelyn.
Look, learn and try and comprehend the reality that this is still happening in our world, and in our very own land of the free.