NEW ORLEANS (BP) -- Sandy Wisdom-Martin didn't realize what she was
getting into when she stepped through the doorway of the Diamond
Cabaret, a strip club in East St. Louis, Mo.
It was 10 years ago,
during Southern Baptists' evangelistic Crossover outreach that precedes
each year's Southern Baptist Convention.
Wisdom-Martin was part
of a Crossover team working to share Jesus with exotic dancers, a job
"way outside" her comfort zone. The goal was simple: free these women
from the exploitation and oppression of the sex industry through an
encounter with Christ that would radically change their lives. Little
did Wisdom-Martin know the experience would radically change her life as
well.
Today Wisdom-Martin, executive director/treasurer of Texas
WMU, was tapped to lead a breakout session on human trafficking during
WMU's Mission Celebration and Annual Meeting in New Orleans, June 17-18,
in conjunction with the SBC annual meeting.
The breakout, titled
"Tricked, Trapped, Traded (Project HELP: Human Exploitation)," focused
on raising awareness about human trafficking and giving WMU attendees
practical steps they can take to join the fight. Project HELP is Woman's
Missionary Union current initiative against human trafficking.
"The
issue of human trafficking is part of a larger worldwide issue of
slavery," Wisdom-Martin told the breakout audience, explaining that
human trafficking is generally divided into two categories: sex
trafficking and labor trafficking.
She introduced statistics from the anti-human trafficking website, www.freetheslaves.net,
which reports there are 27 million slaves in the world today, the
majority in India and African nations. Every year, thousands of slaves
are trafficked into the United States, working in fields, homes,
brothels and restaurants. The average cost of a human slave sold around
the world is $90.
"Many victims that are trafficked to the United
States do not speak English so they can't communicate with service
providers or law enforcement officials who might be able to help them,"
Wisdom-Martin said.
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