Jesuit Refugee Service
London Marathon 2023 - Team JRS UK
Team JRS UK is running the London iconic 26.2 miles to continue the support for hundreds of refugee friends who seek help as we advocate their cause in an uncaring world.
Story
Deprived of the right to work and precluded from accessing any benefits, those struggling to gain refugee status in the UK have no means to afford to pay for their basic needs. One of our refugee friends explains:
The Home Office has identified me as a person with no purpose in life. I have been denied housing, healthcare, legal aid and I don't have any money to support myself.
Our dedicated casework and support team creates a welcoming space where refugees are come to be known, cared for and greeted by name. Offering support to over 300 refugees each month, JRS provides nutritious pantry essentials, packs of toiletries, regular mobile phone top-ups and bi-weekly £15 hardship grants.
When I came to JRS I found each volunteer trying to put in their best effort to welcome me with my name, which in itself is a source of comfort. Each time, each encounter gives me strength to fight for my life.
Our incredible team of runners are running the 2023 London Marathon to raise funds so that JRS can continue to provide hospitality, accompaniment, and welcome to refugees and asylum seekers.
Thank you so much for your support and generosity!
About JRS UK
The Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) UK accompanies, serves and advocates alongside and for the rights of refugees and forcibly displaced people. JRS in the UK supports people made destitute by the asylum process through advice and casework, practical support, emotional befriending and accompaniment, a programme of creative and therapeutic activities, accommodation, and specialist legal advice. JRS UK also runs a detention outreach service supporting people detained for the administration of immigration procedures at Harmondsworth and Colnbrook, including befriending, social visiting, and casework support. JRS UK undertakes research for advocacy to policy makers, alongside communications and community outreach, to raise awareness of the real situation facing asylum seekers and to argue for a change in policies that undermine their dignity and a just society.
JRS distinctive ethos of accompaniment radically alters the beneficiary-service provider relationship and affects all that we do: we place a high value on coming to know refugees as people who are not only defined by their situation in immigration law; we come to know refugees as friends, rather than clients, beneficiaries, or service users. JRS services seek to offer specialist intervention and respond to practical needs, but also to create spaces of hospitality, community, friendship and participation, which enable refugees to heal and shape their own future. JRS advocacy, communications and outreach are similarly rooted in accompaniment, beginning with listening to the experience of refugees, bringing opportunities for their experience and voices to be heard, understood and create change.