Readings
‘Send them home’
This appears as a suggested reading in the 2023 Migration Worship and Resource Pack
[An edited version of a sermon delivered at a Worship Service for Refugee Week in June 2014]
“Firstly a clarification of terms: a refugee is someone who, from a fear of persecution, has had to leave the country he/she has lived in and
Listening to the voice
This podcast is suggested as a resource in the 2023 Migration Worship and Resource Pack
Listening to the voice – first 5 minutes of Guardian podcast
“Did distress calls go unanswered in the run-up to a fatal Channel disaster?” https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2023/may/10/did-the-uk-coastguard-ignore-desperate-calls-for-help-podcast
From start to 3m58s in.
Bible verses relating to migration
These appear as suggested readings in the 2023 Migration Worship and Resource Pack
The Bible on Welcoming Strangers (New International Version)
Leviticus 19:34:
“You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your
Our sons
This appears as a suggested reading in the 2023 Migration Worship and Resource Pack
Our sons, our grandsons, our nephews, our cousins
Are from Surrey, England, Eritrea, Kurdistan, Sudan, Afghanistan
Want to be plumbers, doctors, cricketers, barbers, engineers, nurses, mechanics, actors
Worry about exams
Leave clothes on the floor
Love rap
Hate getting up in
Earth blessings
The Earth –
Soil feels in your hands
As life itself
Blessed Earth thank you
May we remember Earth
Commit to our connection
Today and every day.
The Air –
This breath in your lungs
As life itself
Blessed Air thank you
May we remember Air
Commit to our connection
Today and every day.
The Sun –
This heat and light
As
Solstice blessings
May this moment hold you in gratitude
May your breath be an expression of thanks
May the risen sun be a guidance
May a togetherness take root as the core of your being
May a lovingness be everything you are finally seeing
May Solstice Blessings be the forever opening heart we are all invited to be.
Winter solstice blessing
Solstice, thank you
For providing goodness
Respecting pain
Oh humanity oh Earth!
Solstice rebirth
And ecstatic unity
Humanity and planet together
At solstice.
The light stretching
Open your mind to the light lengthening before you now
Prepare for guidance and gift
Form where the wind blows, caresses and ceases
As the rains dampen and sustain
Where the sun revolves allowing our evolution
Beyond every horizon
Of soil and ocean
I am in the light that stretches my journey from here
Into