Thank you to the Joint Public Issues Team [a Baptist, URC, Methodist, Church of Scotland Initiative] for their statement on the situation in Calais [click here] and for the prayer below, which the JPIT has written. Thank you too, to Sally Magnusson and her team, for the BBC Songs of Praise programme from France last night.
God of all humanity
When your people were enslaved and displaced,
You led them to a land that they could call home;
When your people were in exile;
Your promise was that one day,
They would live in streets of play and laughter.
When your disciples were afraid and uncertain,
You spoke of a Fathers House
With mansions and places prepared.
We pray today for all those who have no place to call home,
Hearing the heart-cry of your word
For those who are without refuge.
Where shelter is ours to offer
Grant us the will and resolve to reflect the generosity of our Creator.
Where others stand in the way of those who need safe haven
May our cry for justice never falter.
May the idols of self-interest and economic gain
Never deflect us from the ways of your Kingdom.
Through Christ our Lord.
AMEN
Thankyou for the link to the article Angela. It said much of what we, as a family, have been saying for quite some time. I have spoken out when untruths have been written about the situation in Calais, and immigration in general, and have been told by one blogger that I ' live in cloudcuckooborough' because of my views, whereas in actuality I live in a town which had 20% of its population declare themselves to be black or Asian at the last census, and which has a growing Eastern European population. Unfortunately, the situation in Calais is inflamed in people's minds by the use of terms such as ' swarm' and 'marauding' by those in government, and by the right wing press which so many people read and believe to be unfailingly correct in what it prints. There are those who believe that people who are in Calais will arrive here illegally and be given money and a house ( I have read such comments on blogs). Those entering illegally are far more likely to find themselves living in terrible conditions, and being exploited by an 'employer'.
ReplyDeleteWe thought the programme was well done, facts without sentiment or sensationalism. It is too easy to forget what terrible lives many of the migrants have escaped from.
ReplyDeleteI thought the statement was well-written and thought provoking - there are too many people who sit in church on Sundays and then decry the migrants as freeloaders here for what they can get. As you say, they are our brothers and sisters in Christ, and they are just looking for refuge as our Lord's family did.
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