Except for when it is. Today is that day, you lucky readers!
We’ve had an agonizing whiplash situation with respect to Syrian refugees here in Canada over the last few months. Of course, if you are Canadian, you know this already; but to recap for the readers in the outfield seats, early in the fall it looked like the Conservative party might win the federal election largely by appealing to anti-immigrant, specifically anti-Muslim, sentiment here in Canada. Perhaps those of you in America are having a well-isn’t-that-a-coincidence moment right now.
Then the Liberals smashed the Conservatives (and the NDP, unfortunately) in a wholly unanticipated landslide win. Since then, our new federal government has committed to taking in 25,000 Syrian refugees by the end of February (this is, to my mind, insufficient but at least it’s a good start) and the new national pass-time has become obsessively watching and reading stories of Syrian newcomers, at least if my FaceBook feed is any indication. Community groups all over the country have formed to sponsor refugees under the private sponsorship process, in which individuals, families or groups commit to donating or raising at least $27,000 per family of four, to support them for one year after they come to Canada while they are adjusting and looking for work etc.
There are of course a ton of such projects all over the country, each of them worthwhile and deserving and a great use of donation dollars, but today I am going to share with you one formed by a friend and former co-worker, Katie Meyer-Beck, who is working with a small group of people to sponsor two families of Syrian refugees (with three small children between them) to relocate to Hamilton.
The short story is that the first family (of four) came to Walking Together’s attention as relatives of a Syrian family already living in Hamilton, and they committed to almost the entire $27k required to resettle them here. Then they found out there was another family of three also related to those two initial families, and they are trying to raise the money required to bring them over too.
As of my writing, they are about $15k short of their fundraising goal. And hey, if you live in the States and you are wishing you could do something to directly support people living through this crisis, and you want to take advantage of the crazy US/Canada $ exchange rate, here is your chance! (Or anyone else too.)
There are a lot of ways to express financial support, and I’ll feel remiss if I didn’t mention them too:
Wesley Urban Ministries, coordinating the resettlement work in Hamilton
Immigrant’s Working Centre’s 20for20 campaign, through which Walking Together is planning their sponsorship effort
and the UNHCR
All of whom would, so I understand, make wise use of your donation dollars on behalf of refugees.
But if it seems ok to you, and there’s still room in the Walking Together campaign when you read this, please consider donating to this effort.
Zoopolis 
It’s nice to see the local response. At first there was a lot of NIMBYism as people scrambled to justify why our now-empty hospital should not house refugees, but I’ve discovered a local group (through St Andrew’s Church) that is sponsoring a family of seven. It’s nice to see that there is compassion as it was touch and go there for a while… I’ve heard that Hamilton’s response is one of the strongest, which is a testament to the community.
That is lovely to hear. And it is great to see the local response. It’s amazing when you think so many of these organizations, year in and year out, are constantly fundraising and working to bring in refugees under private sponsorship from all over the place. They get so little recognition and support most of the time. I’m so glad we can all come together like this for the Syrian refugees, and I hope it spills over into other refugee work in the years to come, personally.