Honduras is one of the poorest Spanish-speaking countries in the Western Hemisphere.
In a country of 8 million inhabitants, 60 percent of Hondurans live below the poverty line. In rural areas, that rises to 65 percent. Two-thirds of children are malnourished and lack access to safe water, sanitation, and education. Less than half of Honduran children complete more than three years of education.
The World Health Organization defines abject poverty as lacking three of the five necessities for life:
Adequate Housing
Potable Water
Nutritional Diet
Medical Care
Education
Poverty, lack of education, poor health care, and few job opportunities lead to the situations of abuse, abandonment, and neglect. The plight of the poor girl child is twice as dismal in a society where it is difficult to overcome the barriers of class and gender. Job opportunities are scarce for those who do not have a good education.
Tragically, Honduras’ endemically high poverty rate makes the country especially attractive for human traffickers, putting poor and abandoned girls at extreme risk.
The alarmingly high poverty rate gives human traffickers an enormous opportunity to exploit people’s needs for money with false offers of work abroad. With the dramatic increase in human trafficking, children — and especially girls — are a prime target. An alleged former trafficker in the sex trade reported he was able to sell up to 40 Honduran girls a day in Mexico for $100 each.
In Honduras where the plight of abused and abandoned girls was once ignored, the ministry of Our Little Roses has become an oasis of hope and opportunity for the girl child at risk.
Our Little Roses is dedicated to repairing spirits and building lives, preparing once destitute, abandoned, neglected girls to enter into society, self-sufficient and bringing change to Honduras.
Each girl who comes to Our Little Roses is given a safe, secure and loving Christian home, and a good education. The idea that she can become whoever she wants to become is nurtured and encouraged, giving each girl a vision of the future that life can be transformed through effort and God’s help.
