Gulf Pine Catholic
•
February 27, 2015
3
Gulf
Pine
Catholic
(ISSN No. 0746-3804)
February 27, 2015
Volume 32, Issue 13
The
GULF PINE CATHOLIC
,
published every other week, is an
official publication of
the Catholic Diocese of Biloxi.
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Terry Dickson
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c
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Bishop Morin’s Calendar
March 1 Nativity BVM Cathedral,
11 am
March 1 Rite of Election, Nativity BVM
Cathedral, 2 pm
March 2 Notre Dame Seminary
Chancellor’s Dinner, 6 pm
March 6 Diocesan Youth Celebration
Opening, 8 pm
March 8 Diocesan Youth Celebration
Awards Presentation,
9:30 am
March 8 Mass, Diocesan Youth
Celebration, 10 am
March 12 Seminary Board Meetings, St.
Joseph Seminary, Covington
Catholics called to do everything in their power
to end trafficking
BY KATIE SCOTT
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Highlighting
the life, suffering and enduring hope of St.
Josephine Bakhita, a Sudanese slave, Wash-
ington Auxiliary Bishop Martin D. Holley
called for reflection and action to combat
modern-day slavery during his homily on the
first International Day of Prayer and Aware-
ness Against Human Trafficking Feb. 8.
We must “do everything in our power
through the corporal and spiritual works of
mercy to eradicate human trafficking,” the
bishop told the nearly 1,000 people -- includ-
ing trafficking survivors -- gathered for the
noon Mass at the Basilica of the National
Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in
Washington.
Held on the feast of St. Josephine, the
day was designated by the Pontifical Council
for Justice and Peace and the International
Union of Superiors General. Last year, the
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Mi-
gration and Refugee Services organized a na-
tional day of prayer for victims and survivors
of human trafficking, and it spearheaded this
year’s liturgy at the shrine.
The day offered the fruits of “compound-
ed prayer” and was an opportunity to shed
light on a pervasive tragedy, said Hilary
Chester, associate director of the U.S. bish-
ops’ anti-trafficking program, in an interview
Feb. 6.
According to the U.N. International La-
bor Organization, there are nearly 21 million
human trafficking victims worldwide.
Chester said that while there has been
Survivors of human trafficking carry offertory gifts
during at Mass celebrated Feb. 8 at the Basilica of
the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in
Washington to mark the International Day of Prayer
and Awareness Against Human Trafficking. The Mass
was celebrated on the feast of St. Josephine Bakhita,
a Sudanese saint who was kidnapped by Arab slave
traders in the 1800s.
CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn
increased education and aware-
ness, human trafficking is in-
creasing.
In the United States, vic-
tims of labor trafficking are “all
around us” in poorly regulated
industries like agriculture, in-
home domestic work, nursing
home work and the food-service
industry. Sex trafficked victims
can be foreign nationals, but
they also are U.S. citizens, of-
ten children who are in abusive
homes or foster care situations.
“You see it all across the
board,” Chester said in an inter-
view with the
Arlington Catho-
lic Herald
, newspaper of the
Diocese of Arlington, Virginia.
In his homily, Bishop Hol-
ley told the story of St. Josephine, who was
born in 1869 and enslaved as a child. Beaten
and whipped nearly every day, young Jose-
phine eventually was taken to Italy and freed
with the help of the Canossian Daughters of
Charity, an order she later joined. Canonized
in 2000, she has been proposed as the patron
saint of victims and survivors of human traf-
ficking.
The bishop emphasized that human traf-
ficking involves everyone and quoted Pope
Francis’ apostolic exhortation
“Evangelii
Gaudium” (“The Joy of the Gospel”)
. The
pope writes that many are guilty of “comfort-
able and silent complicity” in relation to the
crime and have “blood on their hands.”
The pope addressed the global issue dur-
ing his Sunday Angelus Feb. 8, asking gov-
ernment leaders to act decisively “to remove
the causes of this shameful wound ... a wound
that is unworthy of civil society.”
About a dozen women who know such
wounds firsthand were present at the shrine
Mass and helped carry up the gifts during the
offertory.
The women, all highly educated teach-
ers from the Philippines, were lured to the
United States by recruiters with promises of
a better life.
Because of corruption and a poor econo-
my in the Philippines, may people are forced
to migrate, according to Jo Quiambao, sec-
retary general for Gabriela DC, a grass-roots
organization that works with Filipina human
trafficking survivors.
Illegal recruiters use sophisticated tactics
to exploit the situation in the island nation,
and high-level government agencies are in-
volved, often approving fraudulent travel
documents, said Quiambao during a recep-
tion after Mass.
Such was the case with around 300 wom-
en -- 200 now in D.C. -- who were promised
lucrative teaching jobs in the United States.
After selling their homes and exhausting
their savings to come to the states, the wom-
en found themselves jobless, moneyless and
with illegal status.
The U.S. bishops’ anti-trafficking pro-
gram, carried out through MRS, is working
with Gabriela DC to connect the women to
social services and to educate and empower
them.
SEE TRAFFICKING-MASS, PAGE 14
