Welcoming New Families - We're Moving Forward
/As you know, Bethany Christian Services in Grand Rapids is now welcoming refugee families from Afghanistan to the Grand Rapids area. We are now a partnering church community. The first family we will help to welcome will arrive on Thursday, December 9. The family will stay in a residential hotel for several weeks after their arrival in Grand Rapids.
There are several things we can do to help welcome this family of four (parents and two daughters):
We can purchase a hot meal from a restaurant providing cultural appropriate meals for the family for immediately after their arrival (BCS has details about the meal possibilities).
We (any and all who are available) will definitely want to be present at the airport when the family arrives to help welcome them to Grand Rapids! BCS will soon inform us of the arrival time on this coming Thursday.
(We already have a volunteer who will purchase car seats for the daughters and another who has offered to purchase grocery items for the family from a list provided by BCS - MANY thanks to both people!)
An orientation for partnering church community members will occur on Wednesday, Dec. 8, at 6:00 PM. If you would like to join this zoom info session, please let Barb Huitema or Brenda Tooley know - we'll send you the zoom link.
Please let Barb know if and how you would like to participate in this church community effort!
Just as a reminder: Bethany Christian handles all aspects of the families’ welcome and ongoing support – from the airport welcome to securing housing to kitting out the house to helping with school placement and job-seeking to the family’s transition to full independence. We are not responsible for all of the family's resettlement needs. Instead, we partner with BCS to provide a warm welcome, support in the form of advice about things like dental services and schools, car rides to appointments (SSN, DMV, doc appointments, etc.), and a neighborly, caring presence as the family begins its new life in the States.
BCS has a number of informative webpages. Here is a good place to begin:
