Caritas calls a global initiative to conclude its campaign on refugees

The Cáritas Internationalis campaign “Sharing the journey” enters its final phase after 4 years on the road. His proposal was to show the faces of migrants and refugees, and why poverty or violence led them to abandon their homes.

CARD. LUIS ANTONIO TAGLE
President of Caritas Internationalis
“The“ Sharing the journey ”campaign has been a great moment of encounter, of solidarity, and for us, of remembrance, and above all an expression of the Church’s love for displaced people. Christians, Muslims, Hindus, followers of other religions or without religion, were received as human beings ”.

For 4 years, Caritas has promoted, for example, a global march or dinners and lunches with migrants and refugees. The key was to help them learn personally about the challenges they face.

BRUNO MARIE DUFFÉ
Secretary, Department of Integral Human Development
“Migrants are not mainly migrants, but people, people on the move, people in migration. With a personal history, a personal memory, a land and a dignity ”.

The global campaign ends on June 20, but Caritas has stressed that aid to migrants and refugees will continue to be one of its priorities.

ALOYSIUS JOHN
Secretary General, Caritas Internationalis
“During these four years of campaign, Caritas Internationalis has tirelessly undertaken challenges to show its desire not only to welcome and give hospitality to migrants, but also to motivate and mobilize the public to undertake gestures of solidarity to live this moral obligation. And this is the message of this end of the campaign, how to maintain this attitude? How to continue it? “

A particularly emotional moment during the press conference was the memory that Cardinal Tagle had of his grandfather, who was also an emigrant.

CARD. LUIS ANTONIO TAGLE
President of Caritas Internationalis
“These refugees (from the Philippines) reminded me of my ‘migrant roots’. In them, I saw my grandfather, who was born in China, … but who was forced to leave his homeland as a child with his uncle, to go to the Philippines in search of a better future ”.

A gesture that served to remember that migrants and refugees are not numbers, but specific people.

CT / JMB