Refugee Week 2021: let's do #OneGoodThing

This month (14-20 June) we mark Refugee Week. The theme this year is We Cannot Walk Alone. It is a reminder, as the last fifteen months have shown us, of our inter-connectedness and need of one other. Before the pandemic began, events at Boaz such as Family Night offered us the chance to meet and share a meal with one another and, through encounter, learn more about our varied lives and lived experiences. We know that for many of you who support our work, the last fifteen months has brought sorrow for the loss of these opportunities.

Yet we also know that there are other ways to connect across difference and many of us have benefitted this last year from getting to know our neighbours and our communities in a more personable way. During Refugee Week this year we are encouraged to extend our hand to somebody new, somebody who is outside our circles of contact, who has had an experience unlike that of our own. This is a chance for each of us to engage in a bold, collective act of reaching out; a space where we can listen, exchange and connect; a chance to discover what we can build together. 

During Refugee Week we are inviting you to think of #OneGoodThing that you can do to reach out and extend your hand to somebody new. You might offer welcome to a new person in your neighbourhood, cook a meal for somebody, or find out about local volunteering opportunities. Whatever you choose to do, we'd love to hear from you. If you use social media, you can share your gesture using the hashtag #OneGoodThing. You can also email us on [email protected].

Let's do #OneGoodThing.