Three years ago at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in Armagh we were privileged to host a replica of Timothy Schmalz’s sculpture which is entitled “Let the Oppressed Go Free”. The sculpture is a tribute to Saint Josephine Bakhita, patron saint of victims of human trafficking and modern slavery. As a young girl in Sudan, Josephine was herself kidnapped and sold into slavery. She was tortured by various owners who branded, beat and cut her.
In 1883 she was trafficked to Italy but she eventually gained her freedom and joined the Canossian Sisters. In the sculpture Josephine is no longer the victim. She is the liberator – lifting a trapdoor cover to free the oppressed from the darkness and secrecy of their captivity.
Timothy Schmalz’s sculpture places before us the bitter reality and profound impact of the human trafficking and forced migration of real people. Real people, with faces and voices and loved ones; real people, yearning for a better life because of the effects of wars, economic and social upheaval and other injustices. Real people, mostly women and children, whose vulnerability has been seized upon by others who seek to exploit them in so many ways. Real people. No wonder trafficking remains one of the great scandals of our world today; as the late Pope Francis vividly described it: “human trafficking is an open wound on the body of contemporary society; it is a scourge upon the body of Christ”.
“Hidden in plain sight”
Thankfully there are people today who lift the lid of silence and expose the shocking reality of human trafficking; people like you, in Act to Prevent Trafficking (APT), who for more than 20 years now have been raising awareness of this disturbing reality which too often remains “hidden in plain sight”. You have courageously raised your voices to challenge the global indifference that sadly shields the plight of our fellow human beings – especially women and children. Your work is not only essential, but it is also prophetic because, like Sister Josephine, you lift the trapdoor cover, you open the eyes of society and the Church to the harrowing truth of trafficking.
Just two weeks ago I read about “Operation Liverless”, a joint investigation by police and crime agencies, north and south on this island, which led to the sentencing of a woman and a man for a major human trafficking operation. What struck me was that the criminal exploitation of vulnerable people is happening very close to where I live; it is happening all around us, in this case across the north, with victims mainly from Brazil being used and abused, sexually exploited and treated like commodities, mostly due to their lack of English and their immigration status.
It is estimated that around 50 million people are victims of human slavery around the world. It remains a growing criminal industry worth hundreds of billions of euro. And yet much of it is “hidden in plain sight”. Today’s APT anniversary conference highlights the ongoing reality of human trafficking here, and in particular it draws attention to how the new digital age, with its fast global online crime network, is making matters worse.
In Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, he devotes a whole section to this issue, under the title: “Breaking the chains of new forms of slavery” (MH 173–179). Human trafficking, he says, must be recognized as “a contemporary form of slavery and a grave violation of human dignity.” The phenomenon of so-called ‘cyber-slavery’ is particularly disturbing, with traffickers luring vulnerable people “into fraudulent operations and criminal activities, including online fraud and drug smuggling”. New forms of “colonial exploitation” are emerging, including “extracting and controlling people’s personal and health data, particularly among vulnerable populations”. It is especially disturbing that victims themselves are often being coerced to “become perpetrators…intensifying their suffering.”
Pope Leo insists that communication, payment and profiling technologies must not become “instruments of recruitment and control”. He calls for “corporate due diligence, transparent technology supply chains and cooperation between digital platforms, public authorities and civil society”.
In a particularly significant passage (MH 176), Pope Leo acknowledges that the Church herself took centuries to recognise the incompatibility of slavery with her teaching on the dignity of every human being. He draws a direct moral consequence: the Church must not repeat this failure with the so-called “modern slavery”.
Friends, we might ask ourselves: will future generations looking back upon our own technological age, see a Church that noticed what was happening to vulnerable people and acted, or one that recognised the injustice only after the damage was done?
The three “Leos”
Pope Leo XIV is crying out for the Church to safeguard what he calls “magnificent humanity” in the age of artificial intelligence. Since the beginning of his pontificate, he has placed the defence of human dignity, justice and labour at the core of his messaging.
He chose the name “Leo” because he was inspired by Pope Leo XIII who, more than a century earlier, had responded to the exploitation and social consequences of a fast growing industrial society. Leo XIII also reflected deeply on slavery and the slave trade. (see Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum (1891) In Plurimis (1888) and Catholicae Ecclesiae (1890))
Pope Leo XIII actually referred to new forms of economic slavery due to late 19th century industrialisation which he described as “a yoke little better than that of slavery itself.” (CE3)
It is very interesting that Pope Leo XIII invoked in turn the very first Pope Leo, known as Pope Leo the Great, who, as far back as the fifth century, was calling on all Christians to recognise their dignity. In a famous sermon for Christmas Day, Pope Leo the Great, wrote: “Christian, know your dignity”. What a coincidence it is that our conference is falling today, on the feast of Pope Leo the Great, 10 November!!
What is it about these 3 Pope Leos!! Over more than 16 centuries all three made clear the connection between slavery and human dignity. Their conclusion is well worth emphasising: The century might change; the forms of enslavement might change; the technology and methods of exploitation might change; but human dignity does not change, because human dignity is God-Given.
The dignity of the human person is the fundamental basis for all moral opposition to human trafficking. But worryingly, as our own Pope Leo XIV points out strongly in Magnifica Humanitas, technology seems to be advancing faster than our commitment to protect the dignity of the human person.
That is why you, in APT, have been emphasising how much human trafficking flourishes when human beings are allowed to become invisible; when economic advantage takes precedence over human dignity; and, when fear or vulnerability prevents someone from seeking help. Our response to modern slavery must therefore begin with recognising the dignity of the person before us, protecting those whose freedom has been taken, and confronting the social and economic conditions that allow such exploitation to continue.
Shared Humanity
Pope Leo XIV emphasises a simple but profound truth: Peace begins with dignity. And this truth speaks directly to our gathering today, because there can be no genuine peace where human beings are exploited. There can be no true justice where people are treated as commodities. And there can be no authentic respect for human life while some lives are regarded as less valuable than others.
What is particularly disturbing about human trafficking is not only that one person exploits another. It is that, in the process, the humanity of the other person is ignored.
Human Trafficking reduces a person to a source of income, a transaction; a human being becomes “some thing” to be used. All of us must recognise that women and children are most often the victims of human trafficking, and this is why trafficking strikes at the very heart of our shared humanity. Because the dignity of one person can never be separated from the dignity of us all.
When one person is treated as less than human, something is wounded and diminished in our common humanity. When one person’s freedom is taken away, we are all challenged to examine what freedom means. And when one person’s life is exploited for profit, we must ask what has happened to our understanding of the value of human life. (MH 104-111)
The Irish language saying puts it well:
“Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine.”
“It is in the shelter of one another that people live.”
These words remind us of something deeply human and profoundly Christian: we are interconnected; we belong to one another. Our dignity is shared. And our responsibility for one another cannot be ignored.
Saint Patrick
Before concluding, allow me to return to the sculpture “Let the Oppressed Go Free”, by Timothy Schmalz. We in Armagh deliberately chose to bring the sculpture to our Cathedral for Saint Patrick’s weekend in 2023 because we wanted to highlight that Saint Patrick himself, as a teenager, was a victim of human trafficking to this island. And much later in his work as a missionary bishop here in Ireland, Patrick had to speak out against trafficking. He robustly denounced the kidnapping, forced trafficking, and even murder by pirates, of many of his newly baptised Christians. Saint Patrick wrote in his Letter to Coroticus:
“The church mourns and weeps for its sons and daughters whom the sword has not yet slain, but who were taken away and exported to far distant lands, where grave sin openly flourishes without shame, where freeborn people have been sold off, Christians reduced to slavery.”
Saint Patrick writes: “If one member suffers pain, let all the members suffer the pain with it”.
Act to Prevent Trafficking
For the past 20 years APT has lived by those words, courageously putting faith and compassion into action. Your work reminds me of the words from Micah 6:8, who pointed to three requirements of God’s people:
· to act justly,
· to love tenderly,
· and to walk humbly with our God.
To act. To act justly. This has been the consistent approach of APT over 20 years. In a special way, I want to commend the religious sisters who are keeping the mission of Saint Josephine Bakhita alive here in Ireland. You are the hands, the feet, the eyes and ears of Christ, and of the Church. Like so many consecrated women and men in Ireland past and present, you are the Church in action. You present a challenge to all of us, at local, regional, and national level in Ireland, to ACT to prevent trafficking; to ensure in this digital age that, as technology advances, our compassion deepens, our commitment to justice grows, and our respect for every human life remains unshakeable.
We know how easily technology nowadays can reduce the human person to “data, a cog in a machine or a commodity” (MH 180). Trafficking begins when we stop seeing a person and start seeing something that can be used, controlled or sold. And as we have emphasised, this is particularly true of women and girls. The digital age has not created this mentality, but it has given new and powerful instruments to those who would exploit others.
As we continue with today’s programme, may we carry in our hearts the message that every person deserves to be seen, cherished and protected; that no human being should ever be forgotten, abandoned or left without hope.
For every life is a gift. Every person has dignity. And every human being matters.
