Nowhere to Run
Early in June 2019, a national hotline (1-833-900-1010) began operation to help victims of human trafficking here in Canada. The call center is available 24 hours a day and services are provided in more than 200 languages. Human trafficking is underreported in Canada and the hotline will help Statistics Canada and law enforcement to get a better handle on a crime of which most of us are ignorant.
And it is a Canadian crime.
According to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, there are some populations in Canada that are more at risk of being victims of human trafficking than others. These include: migrant workers, new immigrants, youth, Indigenous women and girls, anyone who is socially or economically disadvantaged, and anyone who is alone and/or in a vulnerable situation.
While the factors mentioned above may be primary ones, no one is safe. Young people are lured at their schools, in shopping malls, through social media, and predators often pose as friends, prospective employers, and boyfriends, promising a good life that quickly turns into a nightmare. And because no one is safe, it is critical that our churches become more knowledgeable in order to protect their young people and to offer support to the vulnerable in their communities.
FAIR partners with BridgeNorth to help our Fellowship churches become more aware of the problem of sexual exploitation and sexual slavery in Canada, and to help end this evil which preys on the most vulnerable in our society.
BridgeNorth exists to provide victims with a place to run to, a means to escape this life of slavery, and to begin to build a better one through restoring dignity and value as physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual needs are met.
BridgeNorth was founded by a survivor and hires other survivors to work with those who are desperately seeking to change their lives, to leave the darkness, and enter the light.
For more information on FAIR's partnership with BridgeNorth and the services the organization offers to our Fellowship churches, click here.