http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kevin-m-ryan/homeless-youth-sex-trafficking_b_3321193.html
LInk to an interesting article. A consistent part of many (most? almost all?) of the stories I hear from women in the Tenderloin is either "I was molested by (fill in the blank with father, step-father, mom's boyfriend, foster father, grandpa or other....When I got old enough, I ran away)." Or, "I was a foster kid. It was pretty bad. Then I aged out. And, it got worse."
Nearly every day at the YWAM base here, some kid walks in looking disheveled and none-too-clean. He or she is lugging a backpack and a load of mistrust. It's apparent the kid is sleeping on the streets or worse. We're seeing, once again, the results of a broken foster care system.
These same kids roam State Street back in Madison. They sleep in empty buildings on E. Wash. and maybe - we hope - show up at Briarpatch. They panhandle and steal. And, in tough times, they sell their bodies for food or money or a place to sleep.
Saturday I met Melissa Hathaway from Unlikely Heroes. This ministry was birthed out of Bethel Church in Redding. They have opened one safe house in the Philippines and are raising funds for a second. A team of people are laying the groundwork - spiritually and logistically - for a safe house in Mexico. And, Melissa is doing "scout work" for a similar project for teen runaways and former foster kids right here in San Francisco.
Going to talk with Melissa about creating curriculum for trauma-informed recovery models that integrates healing prayer and clinically-sound treatment tools. Waiting to see what this means. What this might look like. What God has up his sleeve!
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