The Covering House

Photo courtesy of The Covering House

The Covering House is a place of refuge and restoration for girls of sexual exploitation and sexual trafficking.

I recently learned of this St. Louis area organization and I think they’re amazing.  One of the biggest challenges to the fight against human trafficking is in the distance people seem to feel about the issue.  It’s a backyard-effect, when the perceived proximity of an issue to our daily life is a lens for assessing the value and magnitude of that issue.  Consider one celebrity death versus thousands of African children who die from treatable diseases, which story makes more headlines in the US?  Which story will inspire thousands of mourners?  This is because we as a society feel attached to our celebrities, we perceive a certain closeness to them and their issues become our own.

The Covering House identifies the crisis of human trafficking as a national crisis.  They also bring the crisis home, in St. Louis, in the heartland of the US.

Human trafficking has a face.  They are victims who need help, shelter, clothes, food, support, and a future.  The Covering House offers all of these things and more.

The Covering House logo has a story of its own to tell.  The logo is the log cabin quilt pattern.  During the days of the Underground Railroad, a quilt with this pattern was a symbol of a safe house for runaway slaves.

The Covering House updates Facebook and Twitter with their activities.  They are in the process of opening a house, much like a women’s shelter, for longer term care for victims.  Past events have included a 5K walk/run and an art auction in support of the organization.  A representative will also be speaking at Maryville University here in St. Louis next month.

Maryville University has the privilege to welcome Laura Gardner, the External Affairs Director of The Covering House, on March 28 at 12:15 in Maryville Auditorium.

Check out The Covering House’s website and visit Maryville Auditorium March 28!

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Modern Day Slavery Exhibit

Photo courtesy of The Washington Post

Some 150 years ago Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, outlawing slavery in the United States.  Today more people are held in slavery than at the height of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. “Can you walk away?” the exhibit opened February 17 at the Abraham Lincoln Cottage in Washington D.C., where Lincoln drafted the document that brought freedom for millions.

The Polaris Project and the FBI are partners in the exhibit which features victims of sex and labor trafficking.

“Plenty of Americans see slavery as an issue that was resolved during the Civil War or by the 13th Amendment in the war’s aftermath, not as a growing humanitarian crisis in our own country,” she said. “But fundamentally, the same issue is at stake: People’s right to freedom.”

The exhibit will run through August 30.  Perhaps the eyewitness accounts of modern slaves, and the spirit of Lincoln himself, will be the inspiration that will bring freedom to millions more.

The video on CNN wouldn’t embed (technology repels me), but I highly recommend a look.

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