Today a peace walk is taking place in Stroke-on-Trent. It is starting right now as I write this post at Stoke Minster in the city center. The walk is a yearly event and is particularly poignant this year following the riots that broke out last month in many cities including Stoke. The riots sparked off in response to the murder of three girls at a dance studio in Southport, Merseyside back in July. I did cover this in a post at the time, if you are interested then please check out my post from 30/07/24 - Reaching out to minority groups after UK riots
Stoke is close to where I live and over the years I have had a good association with several churches in and around Stoke. It is a city that welcomes immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers and is truly a multicultural community. My late brother Chris, a fervent campaigner for the rights of refugees was very interested that I had an opportunity to connect with these minority groups through the churches in Stoke and encouraged me to be more involved. But then, . . . Covid came along and we were all banned from meeting in churches.
Somehow I lost momentum but still, there was an unfulfilled desire to help people from minority groups in communities like Stoke. This desire has now been rekindled through all that has happened over these last few months concerning the safety and welfare of refugees and asylum seekers who continue to come and settle here in the UK. A possible way forward for me to be actively involved has been outlined in what I wrote in last month's post. This is only one way forward, there are other options open to me that I am presently looking into.
My own efforts to be involved with community projects for refugees may have stalled at the outbreak of Covid, but for my brother, it was a very different story. Whilst Covid was still rampant Chris wrote an extraordinary letter to parliament with a heartfelt plea concerning the plight of refugees. I will let the video below tell the full story.
21/06/56 - 22/09/23
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