Tim Leese

WELCOME CHURCHES'​ vision is for every refugee in the UK to be welcomed by their local church. We grew out of a church-based work in Derby (England) who were running a Welcome Boxes project to welcome asylum seekers who were dispersed to the city by the Home Office. As asylum seekers arrived in Derby, the church sent volunteers to welcome these new neighbours, bringing a Welcome Box of small gifts as a token of friendship and a first friendly 'hello'. In 2018 Welcome Churches became a charity in its own right and we began to train churches across the UK to use Welcome Boxes to welcome refugees and people seeking asylum as they moved into their locations. We also set up our national Welcome Network, which functions as a secure online referral system, so that refugees can be referred, or self-refer, to receive a welcome from a local church in their location. This Welcome Network has grown exponentially and now over 1,100 churches UK-wide from many denominations are part of this Network! Since then, we have vastly developed our training and equipping for churches; it includes training to work in hotels housing people seeking asylum, trauma awareness, good practice in self-care, training in working cross culturally, understanding the asylum system and much more. Our Welcome Plus churches are specifically trained and supported to work proactively, building refugee ministry to be an integral part of their expression of church. We produce resources for churches to use such as The Welcome Course and Wellbeing videos in numerous languages. We are also developing our refugee-facing work through FindYourWelcome.org, empowering refugees to access information in their own languages about life in the UK and to refer themselves for a welcome from a local church. We are the largest organisation in the UK helping the Church welcome refugees and people seeking asylum today.