Refugee Committee

Millions of people around the world have fled persecution and violence in their home countries. The best solution for a refugee is to be able to go home without fear. The UN says that the next best solution is local integration in their country of first asylum, with a chance to live their lives with full enjoyment of their human rights. When neither option is available, a new beginning through resettlement in countries like Canada offers a durable solution and hope for a new life.

Private sponsorship of refugees to Canada began in the late 1970s with the Vietnamese “Boat People.” The Refugee Committee at the Church of the Holy Trinity is proud that, since 1991, our congregation has sponsored over 130 refugees fleeing persecution and violence in Afghanistan, Burundi, Cambodia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Kosovo, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Somalia, and Sudan. We have provided them with our financial and moral support; today, they are making positive contributions to our society, both economically and socially.

Some of our more recent sponsorship efforts have included helping:

• a young single Rwandan woman
• a father and daughter from Iran
• a single Palestinian woman from Iraq
• a blind Afghan couple and their daughter from Iran
• Eritreans coming from Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan

We know we are called to “welcome the stranger.” Our sponsorship efforts are one of the ways we seek to answer that call.