Mother’s Day can be uniquely challenging for victims and survivors of sex trafficking and the sex trade.

Extreme poverty is a common theme in many survivors’ stories, and extreme poverty often comes with a lack of basic needs such as food, a safe place to live, and other basic necessities. When a victim of sexual exploitation resorts to trading sex to meet basic needs, it’s called survival sex. Over the 12+ years that REST has been in operation, we’ve heard innumerable stories from survivors who have engaged in survival sex just to meet their basic needs.

Over the 11+ years REST has been walking alongside victims and survivors of sex trafficking and the sex trade, we’ve heard countless stories and reasons why survivors don’t feel welcome in churches—even when they are devout Christians.

Human trafficking occurs 365 days a year, so, even outside of January when the topic of sex trafficking isn’t as prevalent in your social media feeds, we want to invite you to continue to participate in raising awareness of this problem in our region and society. Here are five ways you can continue your advocacy for victims and survivors of sex trafficking:

One of the remaining contexts where overt, covert, and systemic racism are present, prevalent, and seemingly welcome and unchallenged is the pornography industry.