Diaspora and Flesh Trade

“Beloved, I urge you as aliens and sojourners to keep away from worldly desires that wage war against the soul.” 1 Peter 2:11

Jane::   Hi

Man :  What's your your name?

Jane:   I am Jane Lim

Man:   Jane Lim, and what country would you be from Jane Lim?

Jane:   Philipines

Man:   The Philippines, the islands?

Jane:   I'm in the Manila where the parties are...

Man:   Manila, very cool. How long you'd been here in the United States?

Jane:   A year.

Man:   A year? Are you enjoying it so far?

Jane:   Yes, and I ended in porn (laughing)
Man:   And you ended in porn, how did it happen, tell me
Jane:   I put my resume on sexyjob.com and that's it and a lots of people called me to shoot with them
Man:   Wow, so basically you're enjoying the porno business so far?

Jane:   Yes

Man:   And how old are you by the way

Jane:   35 year old

Man:   Wow, she looks younger for 35 years old, doesn't she, you're still younger than I am, hey can I see your..(censored due to explicit words)

I cannot stomach the next scenes as Jane and her male porn partner begin to undress, and stand naked.. I press the Stop and Eject button of my DVD player and destroyed the DVD disc  Nobody should see this movie, and I ask forgiveness if I have offended Thee for the sinful video that I have seen.

And above conversation was a true self confession of Jane Lim, a Filipina (not her real name) during her interview as part of her commercial porn video which was send to me by a friend from USA who personally knows Jane too. A horrifying revelation which depressed me and my family because she is a family friend when she was still here in Doha.

My family met Jane on January 2005 through friends, she was an entertainer, a band lead singer  performing nightly in famous hotel in Doha. We used to watched her and her band perform and couple of times we invited the during Filipino community gatherings. She used to come with my family to attend our Friday mass too.

It was mid 2005 when she met Joe (not his real name) a white American expat working in a US firm based in Qatar. He was educated and seems to be a decent man and started courting Jane.

After a year, they get married, Jane agreed to her husband's request to end her singing career and start her new role as housewife. Despite of their interracial marriage, their bond seemed to work perfectly. Me and my family has been invited for several occasions for dinner and barbecue parties in their luxurious American house in an exclusive Executive Village in Doha.

But in 2007, her husband decided to resign from his job and the couple flew to USA  for good. It was a tearful farewell. When she arrived in US, we exchange emails and messages on the wall which  later became occasional and finally the communication has come to a halt. I assume that she got a very busy job and probably enjoying the life of a Pinay immigrant breathing the air of freedom and vast opportunity of  America.

Along the avenues of an imaginary love that provide empty promises of permanent migration to rich countries now circles the globe and haunts our desperate Global Filipinos, the cost in destroyed lives has become a blight to rival any of the depredations mankind has inflicted on itself.

I ask God why did it happen to my friend Jane and  how many of our kababayans around the world who are in search for a better future ended in  flesh trade, sex slavery, prostitution and porn business. When will this end? When will they find help, comfort and justice? And when will they find true love?

I pray to the Almighty to touch the hearts of my friend Jane and other Filipinos who are hooked and trapped in the dark hole of prostitution and pornography around the world. May they find courage to resist and cease toying with the occasion of sin and that they may realized that their bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, destined someday for a glorious resurrection.

May God's grace give  our Global Filipinos the audacity to become spiritually stronger to resist all forms of temptation for which have strayed them from the path of salvation.

“Avoid immorality.  Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the immoral person sins against his own body.  Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you have been purchased at a price.  Therefore, glorify God in your body.” 1 Cor 6:18-20