Where Does That Buck Stop?

 International Justice Mission was our spotlight organization in April, and Holly Burkhalter was featured as an inspiring women on this blog, so when Kristy forwarded this article I just had to pass it on.

It's always about money, isn't it?  Whoever has the most money wins the game.

Is anyone else sickened by the fact that the bad guys have an almost unlimited supply of funds?  That people continue to exploit others for profit?  That people continue to purchase the lives of others to satisfy their own appetites?  Human capacity for good is too many times obscured by our susceptibility to self-indulgence, self-interest, self-anything. 

Slavery is heavily protected by those with a vested interest.  It can afford to wait until the good guys hit a snag. Or, in this case, when our government decides we don't have money to spend on fighting it.


Deciding whether government should be bigger or smaller is a debate for another blog at another time.  I do think that if I personally identify with Christ, I have a responsibility to look to the needs of others.  If I embrace any feminist ideology, by doing so I embrace the human rights of others.  I don't always know how to translate that to helping fix some of the big messes of the world, like human trafficking.

I do know it is easier for me to point my finger and say "You guys, you should not slash funding!" than it is to say "I don't need to paint my bedroom.  I don't need a new picket fence (while that fits the metaphor beautifully, in real life our picket fence has become an eyesore)." And dig into my own pocket to give some money to a good cause.  It's easy for me to write the senator about not mucking up my personal drinking water supply, but takes a lot more to ask on behalf of people halfway around the world. Sometimes the overwhelming nature of a problem causes us to back off and not do anything. Or the way it does not affect us on a personal, daily basis allows us to cast it from consciousness.

But does that let us off the hook?  Ignorance may be bliss, but does it absolve us from any and all responsibility?