Resettlement Sessions
Organizing for Welcome
During this session, we will equip participants with the knowledge and tools to create a co-sponsor group to welcome arriving refugees. Participants will leave with a toolkit for creating, organizing and mobilizing a team of people and clear action steps to take to engage in co-sponsorship.
Following this session, participants will:
Understand best practices for organizing their faith community to welcome.
Understand how to navigate and utilize a toolkit for welcoming through community sponsorship.
Understand next steps to engage in community sponsorship.
Presenters
Dr. Muhammad Babar, President, Muslim Americans for Compassion
Dr. Babar is a geriatric medicine physician who is founding President of Muslim Americans for Compassion (MAC), an interfaith and charitable organization based in Louisville, Kentucky. Muslim Americans for Compassion actively supports local refugee resettlement agencies and has cosponsored a Syrian refugee family as a joint collaboration of local Muslim and Jewish communities.
Christine Cameron Ellis, Mission Committee Member at Second Presbyterian Church - Louisville, KY
Christine has a BA in Biology from Wright State University and has worked at the Good Samaritan School of Nursing and Wright State Medical School, in Dayton, Ohio. Her faith and community work includes: Greater Dayton Christian Connections Board, Mission Chair Memorial Presbyterian Church, Habitat for Humanity, Interfaith Forum of Greater Dayton (President 2012-2013), Presbytery Social Justice Committee (in Dayton, Ohio); and she is an active member of the Second Presbyterian Church, and previous member of the Mission Committee and Worship Committee (in Louisville, Kentucky). She worked to initiate refugee sponsorships with Kentucky Refugee Ministries in 2017 and looks forward to many more years of supporting the refugee community!
Andrew Mashas, Faith-Based Engagement Specialist, Church World Service
Andrew Mashas is the Faith-Based Engagement Specialist from the CWS Lancaster Office. He mobilizes local churches, mosques, synagogues, and other houses of worship to work hand-in-hand to welcome and co-sponsor refugee and immigrant newcomers to Lancaster; building interfaith bridges in the process.
Watch Session
Click the play arrow in the lower lefthand corner of the video player, below, to watch the session.