A massive 'thank you' from...
A massive ‘thank you’ from Restore: Thank you very much for the generous cheque for £807.75 from St John’s harvest collection. We are bowled over by your generosity and look forward to restocking our food store to help refugees and asylum seekers at points of crisis.
Who will benefit? The short answer is refugees and asylum seekers: people who have fled persecution in their home country only to meet a ‘hostile environment’ when they seek sanctuary in the UK. At various points they could be destitute or without support. This can even happen after they have been granted refugee status. At that point they have to apply for Universal Credit and the process often means there is a gap when they have no money. The Department for Work and Pensions is absolutely correct when they say it will be backdated but that doesn’t put food on the table today. So we are able to offer food for today from our food-store.
We also work with asylum seekers who are working towards a new asylum claim. Several of those restore works with in this category are converts to Christianity – either in their home country or after arrival in the UK – and being returned to their home country would put them at risk persecution due to their new faith. Some of these people will be supported by other asylum seeker friends or receive £20 from the Hope Projects. We are then able to ‘top-up’ that support from our food-store.
And in the midst of all this gloom, how about a ‘good news story’? Well, earlier in November I was due to go to the Immigration Court to give evidence to support an asylum seeker who is a convert to Christianity, a journey which started in his home country. His original claim for asylum was rejected in 2015. For the past two years a very thorough solicitor has been working on a fresh claim, including medical evidence, country expert evidence and statements from church leaders and Christians who know him well. That new asylum claim was rejected, but the solicitor appealed and that is why we were waiting at the Court to give evidence before an Immigration Judge. Before we went into Court we were told by the asylum seeker’s barrister that the Home Office was offering to revoke the earlier refusal and offer refugee status. People had been praying that the hearing would go well, no-one dreamed we wouldn’t even have to give evidence. What an amazing answer to prayer! God really does do more than we can ask or imagine! The new refugee was beaming – in fact he was still smiling 2 hours later, so much so he said his cheeks ached! What a transformation! This was one of the people that your food donations have helped in the past.
Jeremy Thompson