This Area Is Now Home To Millions Of Refugees

If this doesn't break our hearts, we may need a heart replacement--one of flesh instead of stone.                                

The above map, the latest one I could find, is five years old, and things have become far worse since then. It is hard to imagine the desperation of millions who have gone through the trauma of being driven from their bombed out homes and without available sustenance and shelter.

It has also become traumatic for the neighboring countries who have had to absorb this influx of homeless humanity, the very young and the very old, the sick and the emotionally scarred, all of them victims of barbaric airstrikes, poison gas attacks and other brutal acts of war.

My prayer is that the SOS (Sharing Our Surplus) campaign launched at our last Virginia Mennonite Relief Sale to provide refugee relief could be expanded to a year round fund raising (and consciousness raising) effort, as follows:

Sharing our surplus wealth in ways that offer help and hope to refugee communities.

Opposing war as primarily responsible for the displacment of the majority of the world's refugees.

Supporting Mennonite Central Committee and other agencies that offer aid to refugees around the world.

We have a local planning and strategy meeting set for 7 pm Tuesday, April 3. Let me know if you are interesting in joining this effort!