As International Women's Day approaches, I have been sharing, on Facebook, some of my favourite TED talks which empower women: Eve Ensler on the girl cell, Isabel Allende's Tales of Passion. This morning, however, I want to share one with a warning: it's not easy to listen to or to see. Sunitha Krishnan speaks of her work rescuing girls from the sex/slave trade. It's powerful, heartbreaking, and worth every minute, if it brings our awareness to this most vital issue. I have been thinking a lot about this, in part because I am so protected (dare I say 'we' are so protected?) but lately, popular films like "Human Trafficking" or "Taken" are attempting, in their way, to make this issue more visible, and there are many books now available on the issue, perhaps none more striking than Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity For Women Worldwide by the Pulitzer-Prize winning husband and wife team of Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. As a Baha'i, as part of a faith which articulates frequently and eloquently the fundamental spiritual principle of the equality of women and men, I find myself agonizing over the extreme gap between our 'comfortablity' with the grievous afflictions of the world (what we don't know doesn't hurt us) and our increasing awareness of the depths of the depravity of the world we live in when it comes to the treatment of women and children. This is an issue which transcends politics, national borderlines, or pettiness; this is an issue which is a call to arms for every man, woman and child who wants to walk the talk of real change. Just as the enslavement of African-Americans became enough of a moral outrage for people of heart and conscience to make change, now the enslavement and assault on women and children world-wide transcends outrage and becomes the vilest anathema for those of us who feel this world in the sense of "the honor of one is the honor of all." If my sister is hurt, I am hurt. How many voices must be raised in order for the critical mass of humanity to end the rape, trafficking, and prostitution of children and young girls? I teach middle school in Canada. Our curriculum in the middle and high school years requires that we begin to educate sheltered young Canadians in the broadest social issues of the world; in other words, our curriculum, in the subjects I teach (English, Social Studies, and Health/Guidance), requires us to begin the process of creating "inquiry" about "relevancy", ie exposing the students, through reading, writing, and media studies, to the larger and larger issues of the world in which they live. It's done in small and incremental ways: for example, my lovely colleague MT, in addition to teaching Math and Science with verve and passion, has begun a "Me to We" club in our small rural space, encouraging students to look at the model provided by Craig Kielburger, who as a young Canadian, at only 12 I believe, became so passionate about children's poverty that he vowed to make it his work to change it. Check it out to see what he has managed so far with Free the Children!

It is difficult, sometimes, to believe that one voice can make a difference. But there is not only one voice. Each voice raised is another voice joining a larger chorus. Each action against a wrong becomes a part of rightness. No one is alone in creating change, and when the importance of the change becomes visible and clear to a mighty chorus of voices, then change can and does occur.

I have been thinking a lot about what to write next. I have written books on marriage, youth, education, and elders, gathering stories from around the world. I ground my writing in my faith; it is my faith which gives me a foundation from which to want to make my life matter in the world. I am deeply conscious of my frailties, as one lone and very imperfect woman, but I do not feel alone. I feel the power of unity, the power of prayer, and the power of action. I believe the statement in the pamphlet from the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States,
Two Wings of a Bird, when it reminds us that "The effort to overcome the history of inequality requires the full participation of every man, woman, youth, and child."

How can I use my writing to assist in the battle against the most vile crime against humanity, the slavery and sexual exploitation of girls and women? This will be the subject of my meditations, prayers, and actions in the days, months, and years to come. I thank the articulate voices, Sunitha Krishnan's among them, who have assisted me in my journey to begin to ask this question of my life.