CWS helps equip Chilean churches to welcome refugees
January 2, 2008
New Jerusalem Pentecostal Church in Arica, Chile, is made of scrap plywood and the metal from an old shipping container. Thirty-five plastic chairs serve as pews for the members, whose worship is notable for its excellent music.
"It's a poor church in a poor neighborhood," said Aaron Tate, Director of Refugee Services for Interfaith Ministries of Greater Houston, Texas, a Church World Service local resettlement affiliate. "Nonetheless, it wants to be involved with refugees."
Tate visited the church during his recent three-month deployment to Chile. There, he helped launch a new CWS program to assist Colombian refugees resettling in Chile, a significant destination for Colombians fleeing violence in their home country. Up to 100 will be admitted in 2007 through a Chilean government program much like the U.S. Refugee Program. Thousands more find their own way into Chile, then apply for refugee status. Those granted receive few services, and struggle to become self-sufficient.
Based in Santiago, Chile's capital city, the new Refugee Integration Services Program (El Programa de Servicios de Integration Para Refugiados) is a partnership among CWS, the Methodist Church of Chile (la Iglesia Metodista en Chile), and the Social Assistance Foundation of Christian Churches (Fundacion de Ayuda Social de las Iglesias Cristianas, or FASIC). It aims to build stronger community-based refugee assistance networks to improve support and integration of newly arrived refugees in Chile.
New Jerusalem Pentecostal Church is one of the first congregations to sign on to extend hospitality to these vulnerable newcomers. Along with Arica's Methodist Church, Alpha and Omega Pentecostal Church, and Evangelical Ministry, it began by collecting essential household furnishings for an impoverished Colombian refugee family of five who "didn't even have beds," Tate said. "They'd been sleeping on the floor."
Then the churches set about to plan a Christmas party for the four Colombian refugee families who have joined the Refugee Integration Services Program in Arica, Chile's northernmost city with a population of about 200,000. The Arica churches' example inspired Santiago's Methodist bishop to organize a Christmas party for Colombian refugees there.
As many as one in 10 Colombians displaced
Colombia's 40-year internal conflict among paramilitaries, guerrilla groups, and the Colombian army has created one of the world's worst refugee crises, "and it's right in our backyard," Tate said. Of a total population of 45.6 million, between two and four million Colombians are internally displaced and close to half a million have fled to other countries.
Very few Colombian refugees are accepted into the U.S. Refugee Program, which is constrained by sweeping provisions in the USA PATRIOT Act and REAL ID Act that bar people who provided "material support" to "terrorist organizations" ? defined so broadly that it affects refugees who actually are the victims of violent groups.
For example, a Colombian widow Tate met had fled to Chile after her husband was murdered in their home by paramilitary. "She didn't understand why it happened, because the family had paid the group protection money every month," Tate said. "Later the paramilitary admitted it had made a mistake; it actually was looking for someone else." The widow was granted refugee status in Chile. Under "material support," she would have been barred from the United States.
Church World Service, partners respond
Through its Durable Solutions for Displaced Persons (DSDP) program, Church World Service has been working since 2004 to address issues related to the large-scale displacement of Colombians throughout Latin America. In 2005, CWS, the World Council of Churches, and Red Ecuménica ? a network of faith-based organizations concerned about the displaced of Latin America ? implemented a pilot project that helped 78 individuals resettle in Chile. Learnings led to the creation of the Refugee Integration Services Program.
As part of its support for the new program, CWS is drawing on the expertise of the professional staff in its 36 U.S. local refugee resettlement affiliates through its new DSDP Affiliate Deployment Roster. For those professionals who apply and are accepted, the roster offers the opportunity to bring their refugee protection and assistance experience to bear in the international context through deployment to DSDP project sites or virtual deployment at their affiliate site.
For short assignments ? in the case of Chile, three months at a time thus far ? they contribute to building new initiatives, enhancing existing projects, and conducting research and evaluation to inform DSDP's work around the world. In return, they gain a greater understanding of the global context of refugee protection and assistance to displaced persons.
Aaron Tate,Claudio Gonzalez and Juan Salazar
Aaron Tate (left) with FASIC's Claudio Gonzalez and Juan Salazar. Photo: FASIC
Core services include casework, outreach
Of the first 15 applicants to the new Affiliate Deployment Roster, Tate was the first selected, and spent September 5-December 4 on assignment in Chile. "When I started, everything was new," Tate said.
Tate, along with Refugee Integration Services Program Coordinator Juan Salazar ? who has with strong relationships with Chile's 100 or so Methodist churches ? and caseworkers Elizabeth San Martín and Samuel Pozo first defined the program's core services.
They determined these would include four months' basic living assistance, including rent, food, school fees and supplies for children, and vocational training and support for income-generating activities for adults. Caseworkers would help refugees apply for health insurance and find a doctor, access mental health services, enroll their children in school, and find their way around their new community.
Outreach to schools, employers, churches, health care providers, the police, civil society organizations, and others seeks to reduce discrimination against Colombians and to enlist their support for refugee resettlement. For example, Tate said, the program stepped forward to help a family whose eight-year-old daughter wrongly was being refused enrollment in school.
"A lot of people think Colombia's troubles are just a bunch of drug lords shooting at each other, but it is worse than that and a lot of innocent people are caught in the middle," Tate commented. "There are many bona fide refugees. For example, one of our clients was a civic leader who resisted the local paramilitary's efforts to recruit him. He fled after the paramilitary attacked him with a machete.
"These people are assaulted and victimized by their fellow countrymen and their government doesn't protect them," he added. "I met a man to whom a Colombian government official said, ?Your only chance to stay alive is to leave the country.'"
Chilean churches sign on to welcome refugees
In Chile, local churches are being enlisted to "accompany" Colombian refugees, Tate said, explaining that in Spanish the word "accompany" has a richer meaning than, say, going with someone to the doctor. "It entails befriending, coming alongside, helping them feel welcome, orienting them to the community, helping them with the little problems they have, being there for them," he said.
The program also offers small capital grants to help refugee clients establish viable small businesses. Grantees so far include a client who prepares peanuts with such exotic flavors as coconut and sesame seed, a freelance plumber; a perfume vendor, and a home-based internet café that will employ an entire family.
Enrique (not his real name), the peanut seller, expressed his thanks to the Refugee Integration Services Program for its help. "It's very difficult to make it in Chile, but here we have peace. The little that we have, we have gotten by a lot of effort, and also because people and entities like yours have seen our desire to make it and have helped us out.
"We survive with the peanuts," Enrique said. "We don't earn much money but at least we have enough for rent and for good food. We also have dreams to grow a little more, and to have our own home."
Victoria Martinez from Denver to be deployed next
The new CWS program's first-year goal is to assist 20 Colombian refugee families in Arica and Santiago, the capital city. During the program's first three months (September-November 2007), it enrolled seven families comprising 38 individuals.
In January, Victoria Martinez of Denver, Colorado, will begin a three-month deployment to Chile. An employment specialist at Ecumenical Refugee and Immigration Services, CWS's Denver, Colorado, affiliate, she will work with the Refugee Integration Services Program to increase opportunities for Colombian refugees to attain self sufficiency. Martinez will look for both formal market opportunities through employers, and informal market opportunities through self-employment.
"I'm so looking forward to meeting and working with the FASIC people and with the Colombian refugees," Martinez said, "and to working with microfinance and refugee resettlement in a Spanish-speaking country ? all the challenges I've always craved!"
Reflecting on his three-month deployment, Tate said, "It was a huge honor to work with Chile's Methodist Church, with its history of providing care and moral support to refugees and migrants, and with FASIC, founded in 1975 to help victims of the Pinochet dictatorship and to speak out against torture, disappearances, and other human rights violations.
"Then when Chile returned to democracy," he continued, "FASIC helped Chilean refugees return, and provided mental health services to torture survivors, their families, and the families of the disappeared." As a result, Chileans trust and respect FASIC, and that enhances their receptivity to the new Refugee Integration Services Program, he said.
By Carol Fouke-Mpoyo
Media Contact:
Lesley Crosson, CWS/New York, 212-870-2676; lcrosson@churchworldservice.org Jan Dragin, 781-925-1526; jdragin@gis.net