Strategic alliances protect migrant women in Colombia

By Felipe Herrera-Espaliat, Vatican News correspondent in Colombia

Although she has not experienced it personally, Susana (not her real name) has several friends who practice prostitution in Bogotá to earn a living. They are just some of the hundreds of women forced into this activity, most of them victims of powerful trafficking networks that exploit them, taking advantage of the vulnerable conditions they find themselves in when they leave Venezuela to settle in Colombia. Without legal residence documents and without work, the hope of a better life after leaving their crisis-crippled country quickly fades.

However, on the horizon of her life there has not only been suffering, but also lights of hope and outstretched hands that have helped her to become stronger and open to a more promising future. This is mainly thanks to the programmes run by two religious congregations dedicated to working in a coordinated manner for the protection and promotion of women. They are the Religious Adorers and the Sisters of Divine Will, who fight human trafficking, offer integral formation and psychological support, and provide professional training.

Sister Ilse Villamar, a religious of the Divine Will, is directly involved in the protecting women exposed to all kinds of danger. (@Margherita Mirabella/Archivio GSF)

Empowering women

Sister Ilse Villamar, a Sister of Divine Will, is directly involved in the rehabilitation of women who, due to their vulnerable situations, live exposed to all sorts of dangers. She knows very well that it is not enough for them to receive job training and support to regulate and legalise their migratory status. The first and main challenge is to help them ‘rebuild’ themselves from a human point of view, after traumatic experiences that have undermined them to the core. "When they arrive the women feel dirty, they feel they don't know how to do anything, they think they can't and don't know how to do anything but prostitute themselves. So, these are women who, on a psychological level, need support; they need to believe in themselves," the nun explains.

For Sister Ilse, this social pastoral initiative is a response to the challenges posed by the Holy Father in the face of the abomination of human trafficking. "As Pope Francis exhorts us to do, we must work in favour of life, against this scourge that affects humanity more and more and that enslaves, because it erodes the humanity of its victims and leaves them in nothingness," she adds.

Hand in hand with personal reconstruction, a more practical dimension is developed which seeks to offer tools to women to help them access the world of work. Tools provided by the Religious Adorers, who for several decades have dedicated themselves to training for work and entrepreneurship, both through technical skills and soft skills. In Bogotá they have a training centre and next to it is a factory that has been producing technical clothing for mountaineers for the past forty years and welcomes women who can complete their cutting and sewing course.

Hand in hand with personal reconstruction, religious communities provide women with tools to enter the world of work and entrepreneurship. (@Margherita Mirabella/Archivio GSF)

Systematic coordination between congregations

However, this systematic cooperation between the Sisters of Divine Will and the Religious Adorers, and their growing connection with the labour market, was not entirely spontaneous, but promoted by a project of the Global Solidarity Fund (GSF), a charitable alliance that was inspired by the guidance of Pope Francis and whose mission is to facilitate agreements between the private sector, social development organisations and Catholic communities. This is why the GSF has launched a 'Social Innovation Hub' in Colombia and other countries, an initiative that stems from the realisation that the results of social impact programmes are more effective when religious communities work in a coordinated way, organising and planning, thus bringing the best of themselves, each according to their own charisma.

One of its fruits is Susana herself, who has been able to undertake a journey of personal empowerment and has already received solid technical training in the field of health. Now she wants to broaden her skills, because she knows that life will present her with even greater challenges, especially now, that she is a mother. She has yet to decide whether to continue studying nursing or to devote herself to studying design, but she does not intend to stop. "I have to go ahead with my life project, because I know that I can make a contribution to society, a contribution to my family, and be a hope for other women," she concludes, grateful for everything she has received.

For several decades, the Religious Adorers have had an agreement with a factory that produces technical clothing for mountaineers, and that hires women graduating in cutting and sewing. (@Margherita Mirabella/Archivio GSF)