Congregation members on hand to help Calais refugees
residents from south west Surrey helped to deliver thousands of food parcels and complete the new refugee camp in Dunkirk as part of a major humanitarian effort by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
Hammer church member Sarah Bull received 14 food parcels locally out of 450 boxes donated in the Haslemere area.
She was part of an 80-strong group of volunteers, who travelled to Calais with 2,900 donated boxes in a convoy of 20 vans.
In Calais, the group worked with 60 members of the church from the Calais and Lille areas, to pack 600 additional food parcels and 2,000 hygiene kits provided by the church’s humanitarian aid department in Frankfurt.
Fellow church member Kelli Gilstrap (pictured in red hat) joined Sarah and other volunteers who delivered 2,400 to refugees in Dunkirk and helped complete 125 wooden shelters at the new Grande-Synthe camp, for those displaced when ‘The Jungle’ was dismantled by the French authorities.
The new camp opened on March 7 as part of a joint project between Doctors Without Borders and the local Green-run authority.
The site, which has room for 2,500 refugees, is a few kilometres away from The Jungle, infamous for its squalid living conditions.
Sarah said: “I woke up the next morning feeling extremely grateful for the simple things I take for granted. It was an amazing experience to be part of a team where no matter what the task was, there were so many willing hands to get things done.”
Russell Ball, regional president of the local congregations, who lives in Haslemere added: “This has been a remarkable effort.
“The support from the members of the congregations and local communities in our region has been fantastic. We were blessed to establish relationships with the good members of the Lille Stake Diocese. Uniting with them in the language of service has been very uplifting to us.
“The timing of this event could not have been more crucial.
“We returned during a week of great distress and fear. We were grateful to make a significant food donation and to work on providing more comfortable shelter.”
No comments:
Post a Comment