Supporting efforts to resettle vulnerable Syrian refugees is part of the Church of England’s mission alongside its work with food banks, street pastors and debt advice services, one its leading bishops says today.
Writing in a blog, Stephen Cottrell, Bishop of Chelmsford, says church groups can provide the ‘welcoming flesh on the bones’ to efforts by local authorities and other agencies to resettle vulnerable Syrian refugees.
“We are talking about a careful, realistic, grown-up setting about the task of welcoming Syrian refugees, just people in extreme need with all the complexities and riches of any human being. This is not the church saying ‘look at us being charitable’, but the people of God letting their deeds speak for Him,” he writes.
So, Bishop Cottrell – how many Syrian refugees have you taken into your own home? Or are you all mouth like the Bishop of Manchester?
How disappointing if it were to turn out to be just another instance of the purple haze?
Better idea. Why not destroy ISIS so these refugees are no longer vulnerable and can return to their homes?