The new season of Called to Action will launch on Wednesday, January 15. This season not only introduces a new topic, human trafficking, but it also welcomes a new co-host.

At the end of last season, Sister Anna Marie Reha decided to follow her passion and commit to ministry work in South Sudan, assisting remote villages with education and helping to find necessary resources like access to clean water. After being a co-host for three seasons of Called to Action her departure left a bit of a void, which Sister Jan Berberich has graciously agreed to help fill for Season 5.

Sister Jan is an ideal fit for a co-host because of the extensive experience she has had with social justice advocacy, in addition to her insights as a teacher of social justice at Notre Dame High School in St. Louis for many years. Recently retired from teaching, she still has an immense passion for continuing her mission to educate people about social justice issues.

When asked what Sister Jan is looking forward to the most about this opportunity, she shared, “I’m interested in learning more about it, learning how our sisters and others are involved in trafficking and what they’re working for, who they’re working with, and any information or resources we can use to learn more about it.”

Adam Schicker, the other half of the co-hosting team, went on to add, “I’m hoping people will listen, start questioning things, and start having constructive conversations with their friends and family. That they come up with an action plan that fits into their world.”

At its core, Called to Action is produced to educate and communicate the points of advocacy that are part of the SSND mission, and we hope everyone listens to Season 5 with the same goal in mind that Sister Jan and Adam have expressed.

Episode 1: Intro to Human Trafficking will welcome Sister Helen Marie Plourde as the first guest of the season. She discusses how she first became involved in activism for women’s rights and how it led her to be involved with human trafficking awareness. This is a great introduction to the topic, and it will help us start our path of becoming more educated on the issue. Human trafficking is a system of slavery that should have been abolished over a 100 years ago, but it still plagues the world’s immigrants, women, and children.

We invite you to join us this season every other Wednesday from January 15 to May 21 as we tackle an issue of great importance to the mission of SSND. You can listen to Called to Action Season 5: Human Trafficking on our website as well as on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and SoundCloud.

• Visit our digital media page to revisit the past seasons of Called to Action and all our video content.
• Explore addition resources on the topic of Human Trafficking.