Prostitution

Two days a week I take Garrett to his soccer school which is about a 20-25 minute drive from our house. Every day we go to practice we drive by a prostitute that sits at the same place (a nice part of the city in front of a very nice hotel). We've even seen her in the middle of accepting a client and going with him to a park next to where she sits by this main street. The photo below isn't of the two women we saw. We actually took it off the internet just to give an example of the daylight openness with which prostitutes are free to work in this country.

Yesterday as we went to class we passed by a police blitz. A blitz is when the police set up a road block and randomly stop cars to make sure people have their proper car documents. They literally block off the street to stop cars and then one policeman stands further back with a shot gun in case anyone tries to blow past it. I confess it kind of wigged me out a little bit the first time I saw all the guns. But it's a normal thing to us now. Here's a picture of a blitz to give you an idea of what it looks like.

Not 50 feet behind the last policeman were two (the one we always see and another) prostitutes on the same street. It hit me how sad that was. That you could get a ticket or your car impounded for not having the proper documents on the same block as someone openly selling their body for sex.

Prostitution is not illegal in Brasil. So, it's not uncommon to see prostitutes on the streets looking for business day and night in our city. We've literally seen a city block with around 15 women on it propositioning men (some even walking with women) during the day. Don't get me wrong, it's not on every corner. There are some spots in the city that are working spots for these women and transvestite men. A Brasilian friend and I passed by a street like this one time (close to his house) and we passed by an attractive young woman on my friend's street. I remarked that it's very sad that anyone would sell their bodies like that, and to see a young, pretty woman doing it just killed me. He said, "Uh, that's a guy."

It still is a pretty incredible site to see. I know that growing up in the United States you don't see much of that. Most people don't ever see that. At least I didn't before I moved here. The first time I ever encountered anything like that was on a trip that my dad and I took to New York City right before my wedding day. We went to see the Yankees play and on the way back to our hotel on a late night a prostitute propositioned my dad. He quickly refused and she, seeing my dad meant business, moved on to the baby face 21 year old kid behind him. I politely refused and as she continued her propositioning she grabbed my hand. At that time in my life I wasn't really into seeking the lost and being the light to the world. I didn't really live the "every conversation has eternal consequences" mindset that I try to have now. What did I do? I freaked out. Went back to our hotel and washed my hand at least 10 times. Just like Christ right? Hardly.

I share this to emphasize that we love Brasil. We love living here and love the people. It really has become our home. But, there are still times when we see some big differences between our birth country and our adopted country. Doesn't make one better or worse than the other, but you are either blind or choosing not to see to claim you don't see the differences.

Like prostitution. We (Americans) kid ourselves if we think it isn't a problem in the states. Oh sure, you can grow up in a place and never see it but you can watch the news or read the paper almost weekly and see another undercover police operation to break up a prostitution ring.

Here, like I said, it's not against the law. It's still something I haven't gotten used to.

I know God loves all people and wants all people to come to Him. This prostitution thing has always been a hard thing for me to comes to terms with. I've never been around any of it and just don't see how someone could sell their body for money. I'm also learning how hard living in this world is for many people living in a third world country. It's easy to be sheltered from that in the states. It's harder here. Brasil is a third world country. It's also a country of great contrasts. Our city (according to a recent story in a newspaper) is the most expensive city in which to live in all of Brasil. You can see lots of very expensive cars on the road as well as new apartment buildings being built on every street. But, when these expensive cars stop at a light they are approached by the many homeless in our city. Right beside some of these new, fancy apartments there are shanty towns.

Please pray for us, our network of house churches and all of our Christian brothers and sisters that we know here in the city to be the light to this world and to cross our comfort zones and reach the people that are in bad places. The ones that know they are in bad places and the ones that may be so far down that they don't even realize it anymore. It is hard to know what to do or where to start. We need prayers for wisdom and then courage to act.