May
7
Hofstra Students Tackle Human Trafficking
By Jainnie Hackman, Hofstra InterVarsity Staff
Imagine walking on your campus and seeing life sized cages with your fellow classmates in them duct-taped at the mouth and hands shackled. What would you think? What would you say? At Hofstra University, many passers-by were caught unaware but struck with a very captivating image. Some were horrified and rose to support the cause while others in anger to what the signs said stomped away. What exactly did these cages represent? Why such a drastic visual?
In January 2012, the Hofstra InterVarsity leadership team met for their winter planning days. They spent time praying, discussing and brainstorming ideas on where they thought God was leading them in the spring semester. After much thought, they decided to spend a month dedicating their meetings focused on the hurting things and people all around us. They decided to call the theme of the month, “For the least of these…” taken from the Bible verse in Matthew 25:40. One of the topics they wanted to raise awareness for was human trafficking.
A group of 7 Hofstra IV students supported by the larger fellowship met weekly to plan out details on how they would bring about such a devastating issue to light on their campus. One of the students, Maria Berruti, suggested they make life sized cages. Each cage would depict an aspect of human trafficking- sex labor, human labor and pornography. The cages were carefully made with PVC pipes, welded together and then painted. After gathering facts from reliable sources such as the Department of Labor and International Justice Mission, they carefully wrote these statistics on boards that would accompany the cages. Their next step was to ask the school for campus space to place these cages.
Read the rest.
A group of 7 Hofstra IV students supported by the larger fellowship met weekly to plan out details on how they would bring about such a devastating issue to light on their campus. One of the students, Maria Berruti, suggested they make life sized cages. Each cage would depict an aspect of human trafficking- sex labor, human labor and pornography. The cages were carefully made with PVC pipes, welded together and then painted. After gathering facts from reliable sources such as the Department of Labor and International Justice Mission, they carefully wrote these statistics on boards that would accompany the cages. Their next step was to ask the school for campus space to place these cages.
Read the rest.
