Today is World Refugee Day. A day set aside by the United Nations to encourage us all to stop and remember those in who have been uprooted by the forces of hatred and violence in our world.

In 1980, when I began working among refugees, there were about 20 million refugees, asylum seekers, and Internally Displaced People worldwide. When I founded IAFR in 2009, that number had doubled to 40 million. Today there are 108.4 million people who have been forced to flee their homes, over 40 million of whom have also been forced to seek international protection outside of their homeland (i.e. refugees and asylum seekers).

I encouraged you to watch this brand new IAFR video (4 minutes) and listen to Pastor Gatera share about his refugee experience. Gatera serves with IAFR today as our Refugee Church Consultant.

I invite you to also visit our online Toolbox to get resources created to help you advocate on behalf of forcbily displaced people.