Over two years, El Refugio Ministry received $40,000 funding from ECF to fund the pilot of a new post-release program that offers short-term accommodations for those released with asylum from the detention center. Not only is the Center located in a remote part of the state, with no hotels or public transportation, but the men sent to the Center are from across the southeast, and their families may be hundreds, even thousands, or miles away.
For more than a decade, El Refugio Ministry has been a safe place for these refugee men and their families, providing visits to the refugees while they are in detention and being a “ministry of hospitality” to the families that visit them. El Refugio believes that their most “powerful role” is “simply to be present to the people [they] visit in detention-to recognize their full humanity, to see them face-to-face and to hear them.”
El Refugio operates a hospitality house a few miles from Stewart Detention Center that houses and feeds families for a short period while they were visiting their loved one at the Center. This small home has welcomed many families, feeding and housing them, while loving them well.
Since opening the hospitality house and serving families of those in the detention center, a new program has emerged, a “Post-Release Program” serving those released from Stewart Detention Center every single day. This program began in partnership with a volunteer group, Paz Amigos, outside of Columbus, GA, which is how St. Thomas became connected with the powerful work of El Refugio. ECF’s funding has allowed El Refugio to continue to answer the call of serving the “least of these” by hiring a Post-Release Coordinator.
How You Can Help
As their work continues to serve some of the most vulnerable in the refugee community, a need for new beds has emerged. If you are called to provide a bed or support this ministry in any way, please contact El Refugio Ministry.
