Violence against women is a human rights scandal. At least one out of every three women has been beaten, coerced into sex, or other abused in her lifetime. WOMEN OVERSEAS WORKER scandalized to Trafficking of women has become a global phenomenon where victims are sexually exploited , forced to labor and subjected to abuse. The experience or threat of violence affects the lives of women everywhere, cutting across boundaries of wealth, race and culture. At home and in the community , in times of war and peace, women are beaten, raped, mutilated and killed with impunity.

Concerned with this global phenomenon, particularly the increasing number of women migrations in the Asia-Pacific (ASPAC), either as sending or receiving countries, twenty six Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit (SSpS), representatives of the Provinces/Regions in this zone, met in Bali, Indonesia on September 1-20, 2008, for Seminar and Workshop on Women Migrant Workers and Trafficking in Person.

The Seminar-Workshop was opened at 5.00pm with the words of Welcome from Sr. Ma. Yustina Sukarti, SSpS, Provincial Leader of Indonesia, Java Province, and a simple, yet meaningful Eucharist officiated by Fr. Pancratius Mariatma, SVD, and concelebrated by Fr. Paskalis Widastra, SVD.

Sr. Shalini Mathew, SSpS, current ASPAC Chair delivered the Opening Address. She gave a glimpse on the reality of women in Asia, the situation of human trafficking, and possible courses of action and ended by saying: a woman can only find herself by giving love to others. In being blest, she is to be a blessing. It is her hope that this assembly may become a channel of blessing to others especially the less fortunate.

Sr. Pauline, the Representative of the Congregational Leadership Team, centered her Message on migration as being part and parcel of the SSpS life as missionaries, as SSpS are ready to be sent anywhere. She invited the participants to personalize the experience of migration (e.g. to come in touch with their hopes and fears, their feelings of absence and loss, helplessness and fatigue, or waning enthusiasm in responding to a call to move from a position of security to a position of discomfort wherever the place), and to find God in these experiences, or rather, to discover God finding them. She further commented that while for the SSpS, this experience can be more positive, unfortunately, it is not so for the most women migrants especially those who fall prey to trafficking. It is precisely to the latter that the SSpS are challenged to journey in the direction of being women who, mutually touched and formed by realities of life, specially that of the poor, join with them in a search for ways to be co-creators of a society rooted in Gospel values (cf Gen. Chapter Directions).

Five resource persons were invited to help the participants to understand and to deepen the issue on ‘Migrant Workers and Trafficking in Person’ as follows:
1. Called as Women to Celebrate Our Womanhood by Sr. Anna DC
2. Reality of Women in the Globalized World: Migrant Workers and trafficking in Person (Part I) by Mr. Abhijit Dasgupta
3. Migrant Workers and trafficking in Person(Part II) by Fera Agricola
4. Doing Pastoral Work on Women Trafficking in Asia-Pacific by Mrs. Agustina Nunuk
5. Role of Women Religious in Migrant Workers and Trafficking in Person by Fr. Ismartono, SJ

Besides the input on different topics above, the participants felt enriched also by these following activities:
• Sharing of success story by Mrs. Sulastri, the empowered woman leader.
• Sharing of our Response Today - Province/Region Reports.
• The exposure program for three days in five (5) places: Surabaya (the biggest prostitution in South East Asia), 2 villages in Blitar (sending places for migrant workers) and 2 villages in Malang (sending places for migrant workers).
• Viewing three-hour movie titled ‘Human trafficking’.
• “Sharing of Experiences” from NGOs lay and religious on the theme of the Workshop.

In the midst of full programs, the participants had chance still to visit different galleries of Women, Art and Culture of Bali, to visit some communities of Java Province, and to see the Cultural Program held by our Schools in Surabaya.

At the end of this seminar-workshop the participants were asked to discuss and share the Action plan in Province/Country level, ASPAC level and Congregational level.

Sr. Pauline in her concluding message helped the participants to link the entire Workshop with the Directions of the 13th General Chapter. She said that everyone has highlighted that this is a complex issue. We do not have resources for multiplying organizations. Use the existing ones, with new wider vision. We cannot do alone. Therefore the call for networking at all levels. Right from the start I heard us saying, let us begin with small steps, and share our small stories, small successes....gradual growth. Finally ‘Afire with Christ’ we go as women disciples to carry out joyfully our commitment to life. Open to God and one another, we each pray as Mother Josepha: “My heart is ready”

Source links:
• International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families
• Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People; People on the Move - N° 91-92, April - August 2003, p. 131-136