January 25, 2021
CWN Editor s Note: Pope Francis has written the foreword to Mariapia Bonanate’s Io sono Joy, a work about a 23-year-old Nigerian human trafficking victim. The Pope writes, “I can’t help but ask the reader a question: since there are countless young women, victims of trafficking, who end up on the streets of our cities, how much does this reprehensible reality stem from the fact that many men, here, demand these ‘services’ and show themselves willing to buy another person, annihilating her inalienable dignity?”
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Learn the stories of trafficking victims, pope urges
Pope Francis encourages people to put themselves in the shoes of victims and understand the plight of many immigrants
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Pope Francis has encouraged people to put themselves in the shoes of victims of human trafficking.
Once a person learns about these victims experiences, it will be impossible to remain indifferent when we hear talk about boats adrift, ignored and even driven back from our shores, he wrote in the preface to a new book.
The pope s remarks appear in a book,
I Am Joy: A Cry of Freedom from the Slavery of Trafficking. The book, written in Italian, was to be released Jan. 27 by the Italian publishing house of the Society of St. Paul. The International Day of Prayer and Awareness against Human Trafficking is celebrated annually Feb. 8, the feast day of St. Josephine Bakhita. Publishers released the text of the pope s preface Jan. 21.
Vatican City, Apr 15, 2017 / 01:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- During Easter Vigil at the Vatican Pope Francis noted that many people today mirror the sadness and grief of the women who went to Jesus’ tomb thinking he was still dead.
However, the Resurrection, he said, offers new hope for those who have perhaps lost it.
“That is what this night calls us to proclaim: the heartbeat of the Risen Lord. Christ is alive!” the Pope said April 15.
It is the excitement of this message, he said, that made them hurry back to tell the others that Jesus had risen: “That is what made them return in haste to tell the news. That is what made them lay aside their mournful gait and sad looks. They returned to the city to meet up with the others.”
By Francesca Merlo
Opening his preface to the book, Pope Francis notes that his intent is to deliver Joy’s testimony as a “heritage of humanity”. The book recounts the story of Joy, a young woman who came from Nigeria, and “experienced a second birth in Italy”.
Her journey to Italy was an arduous one, and she became victim of a huge number of some of the injustices migrants face in their travels every single day. From crossing the desert, to being detained in camps in Libya, to surviving a shipwreck - all, unbeknownst to her - in the hands of human traffickers. Pope Francis defines her journey as her