Image credit: Nick Fewings, Unsplash
How can Christians welcome refugees? Stories from Beirut and Bristol
When: 6pm-7.15pm, Monday 17 June
Price: Free
Join us for a special webinar to mark Refugee Week (17-23 June). We’ll be joined by Catherine Mourtada from Embrace’s partner Tahaddi in Lebanon and Dan Green, co-founder and director of Bristol-based charity, Bridges for Communities.
We’ll be asking Dan and Catherine about the joys and challenges they face in their work, and the role their faith plays. We’ll also learn about some of the bigger-picture issues facing people who have been forced to flee their homes. There’ll be an opportunity for you to put your own questions to the speakers.
Join us to find out how we can all play a part in building a kinder, safer and fairer world for refugees - whether we live in the Middle East or the Midlands.
SPEAKERS
DAN GREEN
Dan is the co-founder and director of Bridges for Communities, a Bristol-based charity that connects people of different cultures and faiths and that plays an active role in welcoming refugees and people seeking asylum.
After spending 8 years working in the Middle East and running cultural-exchange programs for young people, Dan moved back to Bristol and now leads a team that help refugees adjust to life in the UK, connecting them into local communities through befriending, sewing groups, walking in nature, community feasts, and stepping stones towards employment.
Dan is passionate about the role that volunteers, community groups and churches can play in this work, as well as the friendships that grow and the change in our own perceptions that take place as we welcome the stranger.
CATHERINE MOURTADA
A teacher by training, Catherine Mourtada is the co-founder of Tahaddi Lebanon and Director of Education Programmes.
Tahaddi (meaning “challenge” in Arabic) is an NGO based in the informal settlement of Hay el Gharbeh, in southern Beirut. It offers holistic support to families facing extreme economic hardship, through education, health and psychosocial services, as well as advocacy.
Tahaddi was first set up to serve the needs of the marginalised Lebanese ethnic Dom community. Today, it works with vulnerable Lebanese and Syrian refugees alike, as well as migrant workers, stateless individuals and others who struggle to access essential services because of poverty, discrimination or legal status. The organisation remains committed to the community development model of its founders, with the aim of reflecting God’s compassion in all that it does.