Familial Exploitation & Religion: How Child Traffickers Find Refuge within a Faith-Based Setting
Alicia Cohen, MEd | September 21 | 3:15-4:15 pm
Topic: Conceptual, Experience | Knowledge Level: Intermediate
Exploitation of young children typically involves family members or other trusted adults selling the child for money, drugs, or something else of value. Manufacturing of child sexual abuse material also falls under this category. Survivor narratives often point to faith-based institutions as safe-havens for the sexual exploitation of children by the familial trafficker, with trafficking often taking place within the church itself. This begs the question: Is the church a missed opportunity for identification and intervention of trafficked children throughout the community? Do these institutions unwittingly enable the commercial sexual exploitation of children with gendered values, beliefs, and norms (Commonwealth of Australia, 2017)? This presentation will discuss why religion is used as a tool to facilitate familial trafficking, how the trafficker presents within a faith-based setting, and how the church can best respond to allegations of sexual exploitation, as revealed by family trafficking survivors themselves (Hassan, 2018).
Presentation Objectives:
· Discuss familial exploitation, including key indicators of exploitative family dynamics
· Describe the presentation of the familial trafficker within a faith-based setting and how the trafficker uses religion to facilitate exploitation of young children
· Identify missed opportunities for intervention and explore best responses by religious communities